North Korea unlikely to meet nuclear deadline

The White House made clear on Sunday it did not expect a deal with North Korea by Monday's initial deadline for presenting a verification plan for its nuclear programmes, but said talks would continue.

"I think it is reasonable to say that tomorrow will come and go without that happening," Dennis Wilder, a senior official with the White House National Security Council told reporters during President George W Bush's visit to Beijing for the Olympics.

Washington has promised North Korea it could be removed from a US list of terrorism-sponsoring nations as early as August 11 if a robust verification plan was in place.

But US officials have asserted this was a "minimum timeline" rather than a fixed date and had already cast doubt on the likelihood of Pyongyang meeting it.

"We continue to try to work with them on this question of a robust verification regime, but we aren't at the point where we are satisfied with what they have put on the table thus far, so these discussions will continue," Wilder said.

Removal from the terrorism blacklist would see an end to sanctions that have mostly cut off North Korea – which Bush has branded as part of an "axis of evil" – from international banking and also clear the way for multilateral aid packages.

In late June North Korea presented a long-delayed accounting of its nuclear weapons programme, kicking off the 45-day process to remove Pyongyang from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.

The 45 days is a window during which Congress can raise objections to the move.