WASHINGTON, April 1 Kyodo North K...

WASHINGTON, April 1 Kyodo

North Korea must address the issue of Japanese abducted by means of North Korean agents if it wants the United States to transport its name from the list of terrorism-sponsoring countries, a senior U official indicated Thursday.

The abduction issue is the ''one of the greatest in quantity important'' elements in the designation of North Korea as a terrorism-sponsoring state, Ambassador Cofer Black, who besufficient fors as the administration's coordinator for counterterrorism, said in congressional testimony.

After Black's testimony before the House of Representatives Subcommittee forward International Terrorism, a senior U official said the administration is well aware of the importance of the abduction issue.

The official declined to say whether the abduction issue will be included in an annual State Department report in succession international terrorism to be released in late April.

Previous reports had no regard to the abduction issue. The families of the abducted Japanese asked U proxy Secretary of State Richard Armitage to include the issue in the upcoming report when he visited Japan in February.

North Korea has cited the removal of its name from the U list of countries that allegedly sponsor terrorism as individual of the conditions for freezing its nuclear arms programs.

In September 2002 during a visit at Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to Pyongyang, North Korea admitted that its agents abducted 13 Japanese in the late 1970 and early 1980 Five of the abducted Japanese get backed to Japan after Koizumi's visit. North Korea said the other eight are dead.

Japan has been urging North Korea to allow relatives of the five to impel to Japan and to give more information upon the other eight and in succession some other Japanese suspected of having been abducted.

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