The United States says North Korea’s reported completion of the reprocessing of eight-thousand spent fuel rods violates the September 19th, 2005 Joint Statement.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters Tuesday that reprocessing plutonium is contrary to North Korea's own commitments made in the 2005 statement and would also be a violation of various U.N. Security Council resolutions.

He said the North should take steps to achieve verifiable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner.

Kelly said the U.S. focus regarding the North is on relaunching the six-way nuclear talks to get to the ultimate goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. He added that the best way forward is to resume the six-nation talks and get back to all sides adhering to the commitments that they undertook in 2005.