SEOUL, South Korea, October 08, SPA – The South Korean president said Monday the global standoff over North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs will soon be resolved, as U.S. experts prepared to travel to Pyongyang to form a plan for disabling the country’s reactors.
“I’m confident the North Korean nuclear issue will rapidly arrive at a complete resolution,” South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun said, citing a detailed multilateral agreement aimed at the North’s denuclearization that was approved by the leaders of the two Koreas.
Roh’s speech was read in the National Assembly by Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, the Associated Press reported.
The president traveled to Pyongyang last week for talks with Kim Jong Il for the first inter-Korean summit in seven years.
The leaders signed an accord pledging to make “joint efforts to ensure the smooth implementation” of agreements made at a new round of six-nation talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Russia and Japan.
In those talks, held at the end of September in Beijing, North Korea agreed to disable its main nuclear facilities and declare all its programs by the end of this year.
At the three-day meeting the leaders also agreed to cooperate in ending military hostility — highlighted by efforts to replace a Korean War-ending armistice with a peace treaty — and boost cross-border economic projects.
“Inter-Korean relations have entered a new phase,” Roh said in the speech to lawmakers.