North Korea today halted all co-operation with UN nuclear monitors and ordered them to leave the country as soon as possible, the International Atomic Energy Agency said.
Pyongyang acted after declaring it would leave six-party talks on scrapping its nuclear programme and reactivate a plant that makes bomb-grade plutonium, in an angry response to a UN rebuke over its launching of a long-range rocket.
"(North Korea) has today informed IAEA inspectors in the Yongbyon facility that it is immediately ceasing all co-operation with the IAEA," a UN nuclear watchdog spokesman, Marc Vidricaire, said in a statement.
"It has requested the removal of all containment and surveillance equipment, following which, IAEA inspectors will no longer be provided access to the facility," he said. Mr Vidricaire said the small inspection team had been ordered out of the country "at the earliest possible time" - most likely Thursday, according to analysts.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said North Korea's expulsion of UN nuclear inspectors was "an unnecessary response to the legitimate statement put out of concern by the Security Council".
"Obviously we hope that there will be an opportunity to discuss this not only with our partners and allies but also eventually with the North Koreans," she said.
Earlier, the White House said North Korea's threat to withdraw from six-party talks was a "serious step in the wrong direction" and urged Pyongyang to end its provocative threats and live up to its international obligations.
"North Korea will not find acceptance by the international community unless it verifiably abandons its pursuit of nuclear weapons," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.
North Korea began taking apart its Soviet-era Yongbyon nuclear plant more than a year ago as a part of a disarmament-for-aid deal it reached with China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States.
As well as the United States, Japan and Russia also urged North Korea to return to the often-stalled nuclear talks.
The UN response to North Korea's recent launch, widely seen as a disguised test of a long-range missile, will have little immediate impact on the North's faltering economy and the divided international reaction could embolden leader Kim Jong-il, analysts said.
But China, which shares a border with North Korea and is the closest thing Pyongyang can claim as a major ally, called on all parties to "pay attention to the broader picture" and exercise "calm and restraint".
A Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said Beijing still hoped to achieve the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula through dialogue and negotiations.
The UN response to North Korea's recent launch, widely seen as a disguised test of a long-range missile, will have little immediate impact on the North's faltering economy and the divided international reaction could embolden leader Kim Jong-il, analysts said.
Experts said the North could have its plant that separates plutonium from spent fuel rods up and running again in as little as three months.
Financial markets in Seoul and Tokyo were not affected by North Korea's announcement today, with investors seeing it as more of the sabre-rattling they have come to expect from Pyongyang.
Announcements like this from North Korea are part of a familiar pattern of behaviour, and as such it is not likely to be a destabilising factor for regional economies.
Reuters