HONG KONG — What a difference a year makes. Last October, North Korea shocked the world by conducting a nuclear test. This month it agreed to disable all its nuclear facilities at Yongbyon and to provide a full declaration of its nuclear programs by Dec. 31.
The agreement, announced Oct. 3, is part of a series of actions being taken to implement a joint statement — agreed to in September 2005 by the United States, China, Japan, Russia as well as North and South Korea — under which Pyongyang agreed to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula in return for economic aid and normalized relations, particularly with Washington and Tokyo.
Implementation of the 2005 accord was delayed largely because Washington accused Pyongyang of money laundering. As a result, $25 million in North Korean funds were frozen in Macau.