North Korea said on Monday it would start implementing a nuclear disarmament deal struck in February and awaits a visit by UN inspectors now that a dispute over its funds frozen at a Macau Bank had been resolved.
A team of International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors arrived in Beijing on Monday and is scheduled to go to Pyongyang on Tuesday to help lay the groundwork for shutting down the North's reactor and source of bomb-grade plutonium.
"As the funds that had been frozen at Macau's Banco Delta Asia have been transferred as we demanded, the troublesome issue of the frozen funds is finally resolved," North Korea's KCNA news agency quoted a Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying.
He said there could now be "action for action". "As part of that, there will be discussions with (IAEA) delegates on June 26 in Pyongyang on shutting down nuclear facilities and inspections and monitoring."
The North said the amount of the funds may not have been all that large but the freezing the assets was an example of what it saw as a hostile policy toward it by Washington.
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