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North Korea will likely miss a Dec. 31 deadline to disclose its nuclear programs as the United States refuses to accept a draft list presented by the North that does not address its uranium-based weapons program, officials here said Wednesday The deadlock comes amid South Korean officials eager to complete the declaration phase before the launch in February of the incoming Lee Myung-bak administration which has pledged to be less generous to North Korea.

The incoming government will not make any immediate changes to the North Korea policy, but only if North Korea fully discloses all its nuclear programs, said Kim Woo-sang, a political science professor at Seoul's Yonsei University and also a key advisor to President-elect Lee on foreign and security issues. In a six-way deal also signed by South Korea, the U.S., Japan, China and Russia, North Korea agreed to disable its key nuclear facilities at Yongbyon and disclose all its nuclear programs by year's end.

The North's sole operational nuclear reactor and other plutonium-producing facilities in Yongbyon are expected to be disabled before the end of the year, the officials said, though they noted some of the activities to incapacitate the facilities may continue into the new year due to technical reasons.

Pyongyang also prepared a list of its nuclear programs several weeks ago at least, according to U.S. and South Korean officials, but the list is simply "unacceptable" to the United States, which believes it is missing the most sensitive item.

"We don't want to see a declaration in which every one can immediately see what is missing. We want to make sure this declaration is as complete and correct as possible," Christopher Hill, the top U.S. envoy in the six-nation nuclear disarmament talks, said earlier in the month.

What needs to appear in the North's list, Hill has noted, is the communist nation's long-suspected uranium enrichment program.

The nuclear crisis erupted in late 2002 when Washington accused the North of running a clandestine nuclear weapons program based on highly enriched uranium.

North Korea has acknowledged importing sensitive items, such as high-strength aluminum tubes, which the U.S. says can be used in a uranium program, but claims the items have been used for other purposes, such as building rockets.

To prove its innocence, Pyongyang has provided some aluminum tubes to the United States for tests, but Washington reportedly found traces of uranium in those tubes. Nuclear experts have noted the aluminum tubes could have been contaminated before being shipped to North Korea. Pyongyang has reportedly dismissed the test results when confronted by the U.S.

Chun Yung-woo, South Korea's chief nuclear envoy, also says the North's declaration needs to be "full and complete," but other officials here said it is as important to move the process forward as soon as possible.

"The current phase of disablement and declaration is only part of the long denuclearization process, which will mean little or nothing once we start the third and final phase of nuclear dismantlement," an official at the Foreign Ministry said, asking not to be identified.

A new round of talks, involving the two Koreas and China, has been held in Pyongyang since Tuesday, but officials here said the talks are strictly limited to discussions on the provision of energy assistance to the North under an aid-for-denuclearization deal signed in February.


SEOUL, Dec. 26 (Yonhap)