Deadlock over inspections

SEOUL (Reuter) - North and South Korea failed to make progress yesterday on inspecting each other's nuclear programmes as an international inspection team arrived in the North.

'The meeting ended with no progress. The North just would not budge to mutual nuclear inspections,' said a South Korean official. 'The North said that what remains to be done is the inspection of US military bases in the South to verify there are no nuclear weapons there.' He said the two sides agreed to meet again on 19 September.

Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Pyongyang yesterday. They are due to inspect the nuclear facility at Yongbyon.