SEOUL, South Korea - Recent activity at North Korea's main nuclear reactor could indicate preparations to invite UN inspectors to discuss shutting down the bomb-making complex, South Korea's spy agency said Thursday.
North Korea has built a small building near the Yongbyon reactor and repaired a road leading to it, the National Intelligence Service said in a report to the South Korean parliament's intelligence committee.
That building is believed to be a facility for receiving inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN nuclear watchdog, according to the report released by the parliamentary committee.
Piles of unidentified objects were seen near the nuclear waste storage facility in the complex and ground-leveling activity was detected, the report said, without elaborating.
"There is a possibility that these movements are to prepare convenience facilities ahead of a visit by IAEA inspectors," the spy agency said in the report.
North Korea reached a deal with the United States and four other countries in February to shut down the reactor in exchange for economic aid and political concessions.
But Pyongyang missed an April 14 deadline for closing the reactor. Still, the regime has maintained that its commitment to the nuclear deal remained firm and that it would invite IAEA inspectors to discuss shuttering the reactor as soon as it receives funds frozen in a separate banking dispute.
Getting the money has been Pyongyang's main condition for disarmament. The North had boycotted the nuclear negotiations for more than a year over the issue, during which it conducted its first-ever nuclear weapons test in October.
The U.S. says the funds have been freed for withdrawal, but for unknown reasons the North has not yet recovered them.
Top White House adviser Victor Cha urged North Korean officials in New York this week to act on the nuclear disarmament pledge, warning them that Washington's patience was limited.
