UN/NORTH KOREA: The United Nations nuclear watchdog has called on North Korea to give up any nuclear weapons it may have and allow UN inspectors to return to verify that the country's atomic programme is peaceful.
The International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) annual meeting of all 137 members, unanimously adopted a resolution that urged Pyongyang "to completely dismantle any nuclear weapons programme in a prompt, transparent, verifiable and irreversible manner".
The conference also passed an Egypt-sponsored resolution urging states in the Middle East to open up their nuclear facilities to IAEA inspections, which diplomats at the conference said was clearly aimed at Israel.
The United States believes North Korea already has atomic weapons and is worried that a recent blast could have been a nuclear test. North Korea denies having tested an atom bomb.
Pyongyang expelled IAEA inspectors at the end of 2002 and later withdrew from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The IAEA reported North Korea to the UN Security Council, which has done nothing with the matter, preferring to let the six-party talks handle the issue.
China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States are trying to persuade the North to ditch its suspected nuclear programmes in exchange for security guarantees and energy aid.