S. Korea, US to discuss renewing nuclear pact

SEOUL - South Korea and the United States will hold working-level talks later this week to discuss renewing their nuclear cooperation agreement, the Foreign Ministry said in Seoul Tuesday.

The two-day consultations starting Thursday in Seattle will center around a joint study on nuclear fuel cycle and conditions for nuclear technology transfer, the ministry said in a statement.

The meeting comes as part of the talks over revising the 1974 nuclear pact that prohibits South Korea from reprocessing spent nuclear fuel.

South Korea has called for a revision to the agreement as its storage facilities for spent fuel from local nuclear power plants are expected to reach full capacity in 2016.

The country proposed pyroprocessing technology, considered to be less conducive to proliferation, as a solution, and the two sides agreed in 2010 to conduct joint research into the technology.