The United States urged North Korea on Wednesday to back off plans to renew work at its nuclear reactor site, warning of further isolation if Pyongyang proceeds with kicking out international inspectors.
"We believe that if the North Koreans do so, it would only deepen its isolation," Rice told reporters in New York, where she was attending meetings on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN nuclear monitoring body, confirmed Wednesday that North Korea was ending inspections of the Yongbyon nuclear facility and planned to resume plutonium reprocessing next week.
"We are troubled. And these are very troubling actions. And we want to see them reversed," State Department deputy spokesman Robert Wood said in Washington.
North Korea pledged in a final 2007 agreement produced by six- nation talks led by China to abandon its nuclear programme and dismantle the Yongbyon facility in return for energy aid and improved diplomatic and economic relations.
North Korea, however, began re-establishing the Yongbyon facility in August, complaining the United States had not met its end of the deal by removing the Stalinist state from a terrorism blacklist.
Washington insists that a deal must first be reached on a process to verify North Korea has fully revealed all aspects of its nuclear programme and a process for implementing the 2007 agreement.
"Everyone knows what the path ahead is," Rice said. "The path ahead is for there to be agreement on a verification protocol so that we can continue along the path of the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula."
"The North Koreans know that, and so well continue working with our partners on what steps we might need to take," said Rice, who met with her Chinese and South Korean counterparts and was to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov later Wednesday.
The six nation talks included China, Japan, Russia, the United States and two Koreas.
The IAEA said in Vienna that it had already removed seals and surveillance camera from the Yongbyon complex at North Korea's request. Spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Pyongyang informed the agency of plans to "introduce nuclear material to the reprocessing plant in one week's time."
Shares fell 2.1 per cent Friday on the Seoul stock exchange on general recession fears. South Korea's won dropped against the dollar.
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