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North Korea will not be easily removed from the U.S. list of states that sponsor terrorism. U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey said that taking North Korea off the terrorism blacklist is a process that will require a lot of time and careful reviews. He also made it clear that the process to normalize diplomatic ties between the U.S. and North Korea can move forward only when the North takes steps to make the Korean Peninsula nuclear-free.
Casey, seemingly wanting to dampen expectations that the North will be taken off the list quickly, said that Pyongyang should answer questions about why it had been put on the list. North Korea's top nuclear envoy Kim Kye-kwan said recently that the U.S. promised to de-list North Korea.
The six-nation agreement reached in Beijing on Feb. 13 requires the U.S. to start the process to remove the North from the terror list in the initial 60-day stage. The U.S. government must report to Congress 45 days before it removes a country from the list. A U.S. lawmaker said that the Bush administration could be flexible in implementing the Feb. 13 agreement, but removing North Korea from the list might take considerable time.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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