US says N Korea must do more to get off terror list

SYDNEY: North Korea must do more to dismantle its nuclear programme before it is taken off a list of states sponsoring terrorism, chief US negotiator Christopher Hill said on Tuesday.

"Their getting off that list will depend on further denuclearisation," he told reporters as he arrived in Sydney where Asia Pacific leaders are meeting for a summit.
   
North Korean state media reported on Monday that the United States had agreed to strike the communist nation from the US blacklist during weekend talks in Geneva between Hill and Kim Kye Gwan, his counterpart from Pyongyang.

"No, they haven't been taken off the terrorism list," Hill retorted as he arrived in Sydney where he is expected to brief other nations involved in the tortuous negotiations on shutting down the North's nuclear weapons drive.

It was unclear, however, if any US decision to remove North Korea from the list may have been subject to conditions.

Hill said Washington had committed to de-listing North Korea as part of a February 13 disarmament deal, but declined to detail exactly how and when that would happen.

"It depends on further denuclearisation. We have some pretty good ideas about how it will happen. But they're certainly not off the list now because it depends on further steps that they're going to have to take."

The US assistant secretary of state is in Sydney on the margins of a summit of leaders of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, including US President George W Bush who was due to arrive later on Tuesday.

North Korea has already shut down its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon under a six-nation agreement reached on February 13 between itself, the United States, China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.