US Begins Preparations for NK’s Delisting
The United States is preparing to remove North Korea from a terrorism blacklist now that the North has submitted its nuclear declaration.
U.S. President George W. Bush notified Congress on Thursday of his administration’s decision to take the North off its list of state terrorism sponsors.
In making the notification, Bush said the North had not engaged in any terrorist activities in the past six months and thus had met basic requirements for delisting.
The North will be taken off the list on August eleventh unless the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives formally express opposition. The North’s envisioned removal comes 20 years after it was blacklisted for the 1987 bombing of a South Korean airliner that killed all 155 people aboard.
Meanwhile, Bush also announced he was ending trade sanctions imposed on North Korea under the Trading With the Enemy Act from one-oh-one p.m., Korean time.