China is pleased with the ongoing progress made in decommissioning North Korea's nuclear installations, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Thursday.

Technical experts from Russia, China, Japan and South Korea start inspections of North Korea's nuclear facilities on Tuesday to observe the country's denuclearization progress.

North Korea has resumed public executions. In October a factory chief accused of making international phone calls was shot down at a stadium before a crowd of 150,000 people.

Experts from Russia, China, Japan and South Korea will visit North Korea on November 27-29 to observe the progress on disabling the country's nuclear program, a Russian Foreign Ministry source said on Friday.

Participants in six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear program may soon announce the next round of negotiations, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman told a press conference on Thursday.

North and South Korea have reached more agreements on expanding links between the two countries still technically at war.

South and North Korea have agreed in principle to open a cross-border railroad for regular cargo service this year, the Yonhap news agency quoted a South Korean official as saying on Thursday.

The prime ministers of North and South Korea are trying to push forward what their presidents set in motion at last month's summit. On the opening day of talks in Seoul, the two leaders vowed to start implementing an agreement to boost already strong South Korean aid and investment in the impoverished North.

A failure by the United States to take North Korea off a list of state sponsors of terrorism could give the North a justification for walking away from six-nation nuclear disarmament talks.

North Korea announced it was willing to cooperate with its traditional foe the United States in fighting terrorism, and thanked the U.S. for its recent help in rescuing North Korean sailors.

A South Korean official says North Korea is expected to give the first complete account of its nuclear programs in one or two weeks as part of an international disarmament agreement.

A senior U.S. envoy who spent this weekend in North Korea says authorities there are cooperating in the process of disabling the country's nuclear facilities. As VOA's Kurt Achin reports from Seoul, the shutdown is part of a wider diplomatic process aimed at ending Pyongyang's nuclear weapons capabilities for good.