- SEOUL (Reuters) - Communist
North Korea will stop using U.S. dollars from next month, China's Xinhua
news agency said, following a U.S. decision to halt oil shipments to Pyongyang.
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- The move highlights racked-up tensions between Washington
and Pyongyang after North Korea, branded part of an "axis of evil"
along with Iran and Iraq by U.S. President George Bush, admitted it was
pursuing a nuclear-weapons program.
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- North Koreans and foreigners would have to convert dollar
accounts at Pyongyang's state-run Korean Trade Bank into euros or other
currencies, Xinhua said Friday, quoting a letter from the state-owned bank
in charge of foreign-exchange business.
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- "Hotels, foreign-exchange shops and foreign-related
services will receive no U.S. dollars from the start of December,"
a staff member of the Korean Trade Bank was quoted as saying.
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- U.S. dollar accounts would be automatically changed into
euros if account holders made no declaration by the end of November, the
bank letter said.
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- The dollar ban was part of "political means"
to counter the pressure from the United States over the nuclear issue,
Xinhua quoted an unnamed British diplomat as saying.
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- The United States has suspended fuel-oil shipments from
December in an effort to force Pyongyang to abandon the program.
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- North Korea has called the oil cut-off -- which takes
effect as North Korea's sub-zero winter sets in -- a "wanton violation"
of the pledges of energy aid for Pyongyang.
-
- Under a 1994 "Agreed Framework," North Korea
promised to freeze its nuclear-weapons program in return for fuel oil,
paid by Washington, and two light water reactors that cannot easily be
converted to produce atomic-weapons material.
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- Xinhua said the Korean Trade Bank had also asked diplomatic
missions and international institutions to use euros and other currencies,
not dollars.
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- Sample euros in banknotes and coins were displayed outside
the Korean Trade Bank, with a poster notifying local residents to change
their dollars, but no deadline was given, Xinhua said.
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