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North Korea has been pursuing nuclear arms for decades, and has in the past reneged on promises to freeze its programmes. Pyongyang’s ruling dynasty — Great Leader Kim Il Sung, who died in 1994, and his son the Dear Leader, Kim Jong Il — has long regarded a nuclear ability as a deterrent against the United States and a trump card when it comes to negotiating any deal.

North Korea may again prove unwilling, as this latest agreement goes into effect, to go through with a pledge that will require it to relinquish that capability. Christopher Hill, the chief US negotiator, was swift to cite the difficulties of implementation.

“Whether this agreement helps solve this will depend in large measure on what we do in the days and weeks that follow,” he said. “We need to take the momentum of this agreement and work to see that it is implemented.”

Washington had said that it would not accept a broad statement in principle that put off the tough issues until later. Nevertheless, this agreement is heavy with rhetoric but light on detail.

Bob Broadfoot, the managing director of Political and Economic Risk Consultancy in Hong Kong, said: “I suspect anything they’ve signed is built around a philosophy of ‘show me first’. The devil will be in the detail of who’s allowed to inspect the status of North Korea’s programme. And you can bet there’ll be some controversy around that.”

Much will depend on the sequencing of the deal. The parties are due to reconvene in November in Beijing, with the US set to insist on complete and verifiable dismantling of the North’s nuclear programmes, its acknowledged plutonium plant and secret uranium facilities.

Pyongyang will demand formal diplomatic ties with the US. But which will come first? China may have to continue to exert more of the pressure over North Korea that was crucial in reaching this agreement, and keep tempers cooled.

The US once labelled the North part of an “axis of evil”, and then this year called it an “outpost of tyranny”. One Pyongyang newspaper denounced President Bush as “the kingpin of terrorists”.

Indeed, the threat of war is never far from Korea, the location of the world’s most heavily fortified frontier.

This no man’s land, known as the demilitarised zone, has divided the communist North from the capitalist South since the 1950-53 Korean War ended. When negotiators gather in November, much of the hardest work will still lie ahead.

KEY MOMENTS

1993: North Korea quits Non-Proliferation Treaty; later suspends withdrawal

1994: North Korea and US sign a nuclear safeguard accord after Pyongyang vows to freeze nuclear weapons programme

Sept 17, 1999: President Clinton agrees to easing of economic sanctions against North Korea

Oct 4, 2002: North Korean officials tell US delegation that Pyongyang has a covert uranium nuclear weapons programme, Washington says

Jan 10, 2003: North Korea again withdraws from Non-Proliferation Treaty

Aug 27-29: North Korea joins six-party talks on its nuclear programme

Feb 10, 2005: North Korea says it has nuclear weapons

Sept 19: North Korea pledges to dismantle its nuclear programmes

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