North Korea Vows To Drop Nuclear Weapons Development

While the US has been arguing over who should shoulder the lion’s share of the blame over the pre- and post-Hurricane Katrina response this past weekend, North Korea has apparently agreed to drop its nuclear weapons programs:

BEIJING — North Korea pledged to drop its nuclear weapons development and rejoin international arms treaties in a unanimous agreement Monday with other countries at six-party arms talks. The joint statement was the first ever after more than two years of negotiations.

The North "promised to drop all nuclear weapons and current nuclear programs and to get back to the (Nuclear) Nonproliferation Treaty as soon as possible and to accept inspections" by the International Atomic Energy Agency, according to the agreement by the six countries at the talks.

"All six parties emphasized that to realize the inspectable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula is the target of the six-party talks," the statement said.

Obviously, it remains to be seen as to whether or not North Korea honors their part of the agreement. We know that the agreement struck between Carter, Clinton and North Korea back in 1994 wasn’t worth the paper it was written on. I’m encouraged, however, that the six party talks have started to bear some fruit, at least in terms of getting North Korea to commit to certain conditions. I have to wonder now if John Kerry, who was so against six party talks in favor of "unilateral" discussions between the US and North Korea, will extend any praise towards the President for sticking to his guns on the six nation talks.

(Cross-posted at BlogsForBush)

More: Scrappleface:

Under the terms of the draft agreement, North Korea’s official name — the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) — will change to the more accurate Tyrannical Megalomaniac’s Empire of Korea (TMEK), an honest acknowledgment of Kim Jong-Il’s dictatorial cult-of-personality rule.

Heh.