North Korea deal back on

North Korea announced this week that it would resume dismantling its nuclear weapons program now that the United States has officially removed the country from its list of state sponsors of terrorism. Washington’s move came as the Bush administration’s hard-won nuclear deal with Pyongyang had begun to unravel. North Korea had kicked out United Nations inspectors and restarted some of its weapons facilities, saying the U.S. had gone back on its promise, last June, to remove it from the terror blacklist. This week, North Korea said inspectors could return to monitor the disabling of its Yongbyon nuclear plant.

The U.S. had wanted the right to inspect any other suspicious sites, but North Korea would agree only to grant such access “based on mutual consent,” a standard that’s guaranteed to mean future wrangling. “Going into verification with North Korea will not be easy,” said State Department negotiator Patricia McNerney. “This is the most secret and opaque regime in the world.”

America’s surrender to North Korea is now complete, said former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton in The Wall Street Journal. Removing the regime from the terror list, which carries strict economic sanctions, only rewards it for its “bluff and bluster.” In return the U.S. gets only what North Korea had already promised—and failed to deliver. This capitulation sends a clear message to Iran: Get nukes, and the U.S. will do whatever you demand.

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North Korea is admittedly unworthy of trust, but this agreement is hardly a capitulation, said The New York Times in an editorial. Inspectors will return to the country, and North Korea knows that full-out resistance will put the country back on the terrorism list. The alternative—a hard-line policy of threatening and isolating the country—already has proved not to work. By sacrificing its image of toughness, said Victor Cha in The Washington Post, the Bush administration has shown some real leadership at last. “With this agreement, Bush is likely to leave his successor the remnants of a workable nuclear disablement process rather than a full-blown crisis.”