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Seoul: North Korea on Friday said it will not take further steps to dismantle its nuclear programme until the US and its other negotiating partners award fuel oil and political benefits promised under an aid-for-disarmament deal.
The North Korean Foreign Ministry said in a statement it has disabled 80 per cent of its main nuclear complex, but countries involved in six-nation disarmament talks have only made 40 per cent of the energy shipments promised to the North. The energy-starved North was promised the aid equivalent of 1 million tonnes of heavy fuel oil under the February 2007 deal with China, South Korea, Russia, Japan and the United States.
The ministry statement said North Korea has shown its resolve to disarm by destroying a cooling tower at its Yongbyon nuclear complex last week _ a measure it says was required under the next phase of a denuclearisation deal.
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