The U.N. Development Program (UNDP) reportedly plans to resume operations in North Korea in February.

Voice of America quoted UNDP spokesman Stephane Dujarric as saying Saturday the agency’s Pyongyang office will resume normal operations at the end of February.

The UNDP office in Pyongyang has been shut down for nearly three years as speculations arose in 2007 that North Korea was diverting aid money provided by the program.

Dujarric said the remodeling of the Pyongyang office was completed in September and works are underway to install furniture and other equipment and connect to the Internet.

He added that currently three of the agency’s employees are residing in Pyongyang and that the agency has recruited 13 local employees.

The UNDP’s Pyongyang office is reportedly planning to launch six projects, worth nearly three billion won, in the first quarter of next year. Such projects include providing daily necessities, collecting statistics data and developing human resources.

The UNDP had launched various development projects in North Korea since 1981. However, such projects have been suspended since March 2007, when the agency’s staff withdrew from Pyongyang following U.S. allegations of funds embezzlement by the North.