A leading Japanese daily says South Korea, the United States and Japan have reached an agreement to extend by one year the suspension of a project to build two light-water reactors in North Korea.
The Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper said Monday that the decision was reached after the United States expressed support to calls by South Korea and Japan that the project's lifetime should be extended rather than terminated altogether so that it could be used to induce the North to abandon its nuclear ambitions.
Following the decision, the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) is expected to formally adopt an extension at a meeting scheduled to be held on Oct. 13 in New York.
The light-water reactor project was launched in line with the 1994 Agreed Framework between the United States and North Korea, under which Washington pledged to provide the reactors in exchange for Pyongyang freezing its nuclear development programs.
South Korea is picking up 70 percent of the project's 4.6 billion dollar price tag.
KEDO, the international consortium in charge of the reactor project, suspended construction on the reactors last December amid fresh tensions over North Korea's nuclear weapons program.