According to the Associated Press, the Bush administration is ready to pay $20 million to North Korea to complete the last 3 steps (of 12—not to be confused with these 12 steps) to permanently disable its Yongbyon nuclear reactor.
North Korea for its part, says it does not want to address future dismantling work until it receives the goodies it was promised for the first nine stages of Yongbyon decomission.
The North Korean Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it had disabled 80 percent of its main nuclear complex, but that the six countries involved in disarmament talks had made only 40 percent of the energy shipments they had promised. North Korea said it would move to the next phase of the denuclearization process, abandoning and dismantling its nuclear weapons programs, only when it has been awarded all the energy and political benefits it had been promised.
Read the full articles here:
US has $20M to disable NKorean reactor
Associated Press
7/4/2008
North Korea: Foreign Quid Wanted Before Providing the Nuclear Quo
Associated Press (via the New York Times)
7/5/2008
