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As North Korea has agreed to disable its nuclear facilities and report on how it is implementing the disablement steps within the year, the timing of when the United States will begin the process of removing North Korea from its list of states supporting terrorism has become a crucial point in determining relations between the two countries.

The Bush administration is expected to submit a report on removing the North from the list to the U.S. Congress within the year, if North Korea faithfully implements the second step of the February 13 agreement to disable its nuclear facilities and report its nuclear weapon programs, according to sources in Washington. North Korea is not likely object to this.

However, the report must be submitted to Congress 45 days before lifting the communist country off the black list and in order to do this by the end of the year, the reporting should be done before November 16. Both the White House and the U.S. State Department were silent about this matter on November 15, a day before that deadline.

Neither Washington nor Pyongyang seem not to be bound by the deadline either, but this is perhaps because at the moment the Bush administration informs Congress that it will remove the North from the list, it will have an immediate political effect.

As North Korea and the United States have made strides in normalizing their relations, President Bush’s report to Congress can be synchronized to occur after North Korea’s report on implementation without any problems, said another source, adding that the two countries had already agreed to this. The remaining problem is whether or not North Korea’s report will satisfy the United States.

Of course, the reason the U.S. administration has postponed the removal of the North from the list is because North Korea has not yet fulfilled its promise of reporting its nuclear programs under the February 13 agreement. North Korea was added to the terror list following the bombing of KAL Flight 858 by North Korean agents on November 29, 1987.

The United States, however, seems also to be conscious of the implications of Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda’s planned visit to Washington on November 16-17.

When he left Japan on November 15, Fukuda remarked that the United States should consider the importance of Japan-U.S. relations (in relation to the removal of the North from the list).

It is unclear how Bush will respond, but the administration has thus far taken the position that the issue of Japanese citizens abducted to the North should not be a stumbling block to resolving the North Korean nuclear issue.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]