Cold comfort in Pyongyang's concession

NORTH Korea has accepted the necessity for inspection of its declared nuclear facilities by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), but the international tension surrounding its suspected pursuit of nuclear weaponry is far from over.

For, after nearly a year of on-and-off negotiations, following Pyongyang's stated intention to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NNPT), the North Korean decision yesterday only takes the situation roughly back to where it was when the crisis began.

That was when Pyongyang balked at the IAEA making special inspections on demand of facilities which North Korea had not declared to the IAEA.

The demand arose because satellite photos revealed what the North Koreans had tried hard to conceal - two facilities which were in fact connected to nuclear installations, and in which nuclear waste was being held prior to the probably extraction of plutonium.

Faced with these demands, the North Koreans withdrew from the NNPT, a withdrawal which they have only suspended so far.

All that North Korea has now agreed is that its seven declared facilities can be inspected once again by the IAEA.

On February 21, the IAEA was due to declare North Korea in default on inspections, and to send the issue back to the UN Security Council (UNSC) for action.

So far, no official statements have been forthcoming from Pyongyang, confirming its compliance, as notified to the IAEA by a North Korean diplomat in Vienna.

This is in itself important, given North Korea's tendency to frequently say one thing and do another.

The North Korean concession - if such it be - comes just as firm pressure was finally being brought to bear after much diplomatic dithering by the US and South Korea.

The UNSC was expected to agree on sanctions - provided that China did not exercise its veto.

The US and South Korea were re-organising Exercise Team Spirit for next month, a development which North Korea would prefer to avoid.

The North Korean move thus appears to confirm that the isolated and unpredictable regime does tend to respond to firm diplomatic positions, whenever these are applied.

Conceivably, the North Koreans belatedly recognised that their refusal to accept the numerous diplomatic carrots offered by the US and South Korea in the last twelve months was resulting in hardline views coming to the fore, particularly in Washington.

The fact remains that North Korea has still not agreed to the two demand inspections.

Similarly, it has not yet resumed negotiations with South Korea over the Seoul-Pyongyang agreement to de-nuclearise the peninsula, a demand made by the US.

''There is no euphoria,'' IAEA spokesman David Kyd said yesterday. ''We are just at the beginning of a long hard road''.

According to one informed source, there are not just two, but 26, suspect facilities which the IAEA ought to be able to inspect on demand.