BEIJING - Negotiators at North Korea's disarmament talks tentatively agreed to a draft plan Sunday on disabling the country's nuclear facilities by year's end, though they said the detailed blueprint required further consideration by their governments.
The four days of talks, which began on an optimistic note after North Korea earlier agreed to a Dec. 31 deadline, were supposed to set specifics for the disabling, among other issues. Envoys described the talks as being in recess, with host China saying that they may reconvene in 48 hours depending on what the six governments -- China, the United States, Japan, Russia and North and South Koreas -- decide.
The draft "lays out an entire roadmap until the end of the year" for the North's nuclear disarmament, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill told reporters before boarding a plane for New York.
"We're into the nuts and bolts now of implementing de-nuclearization," Hill said. He said the level of detail, which he declined to discuss, made it necessary for him to return to Washington for consultations.
South Korean envoy Chun Yung-woo said the proposed blueprint set some deadlines for North Korea and for the other parties to meet.
The six country are pushing forward a February agreement under which communist, impoverished North Korea agreed to declare and dismantle all its nuclear programs in return for 1 million tons of heavy fuel oil or other assistance. Under that deal, the terms for the North's declaration and the dismantling should have been agreed upon five months ago.
Talks have dragged on for four years but if ultimately successful would roll back a nuclear program that a year ago allowed North Korea to detonate a nuclear device and that experts say may have produced more than a dozen nuclear bombs.
Agreement on the blueprint would be a boost for South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun ahead of a rare summit this week with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. In his efforts to promote rapprochement with the North, Roh has sometimes appeared to be out of step with South Korean ally, the United States.
"Many countries exerted the spirit of compromise. In particular, North Korea made many concessions," South Korea's Chun told reporters.
Under terms in the draft, North Korea reiterated its Dec. 31 deadline for declaring and disabling its nuclear programs and accepted that other parties would not be able to deliver all aid within that time, Chun said. He said that South Korea by year's end would only have delivered about a third of the economic and energy assistance it promised to.
While the U.S. also restated its intention eventually to remove North Korea from a list of countries that sponsor terrorism, the draft did not set a deadline, Chun said.
Envoys, however, did not comment on whether the draft addressed earlier sticking points. During the recent talks, disagreement arose over the definition of disabling. Hill said earlier that the U.S. wants a dismantling process that means a nuclear facility could not be made operational for at least 12 months.
Washington also wants North Korea to declare a suspected uranium enrichment program along with the plutonium program that has produced nuclear bomb material.
