North Korea Says Earlier Disclosure Was Enough

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea said Friday that it had already explained enough about its nuclear programs to meet a deadline for declaring its nuclear activities, saying the information was in a nuclear declaration it prepared in November and gave to the United States.

The statement from the North Korean Foreign Ministry on Friday was carried by the Korean Central News Agency, North Korea’s voice to the outside world. It was the country’s first official pronouncement after it missed a Dec. 31 deadline to disable its main nuclear complex at Yongbyon, north of Pyongyang, and, according to other nations involved in six-nation talks, failed to provide a full list of its nuclear activities, including weapons, facilities and fissile material.

The statement said that North Korea had already conducted “enough discussions” with the United States officials after they demanded more negotiations on its November draft declaration. Using the abbreviation of the North’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Foreign Ministry said, “As far as the nuclear declaration on which wrong opinion is being built up by some quarters is concerned, the D.P.R.K. has done what it should do.”

In Washington, officials disputed North Korea’s claims, saying the government in Pyongyang had not yet provided a declaration. They muted their criticism, however, and said that issue had not reached an impasse........