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WASHINGTON (AP) - The breakthrough nuclear agreement with North Korea could pay wide-ranging dividends for all sides, especially in the area of already improving U.S. relations with China and America's allies, chief U.S. negotiator Christopher Hill said Thursday.
Other side benefits might include a peace treaty formally ending the war on the Korean peninsula after more than a half-century, a cut in the force of 25,000 U.S. troops in South Korea, a better life for impoverished North Koreans and the State Department's declassifying of the North as a sponsor of terror, Hill said in remarks at the Brookings Institution, a liberal-oriented think tank.
The U.S. negotiator said he plans to meet with North Korean counterparts within 30 days to work on these issues and a schedule for North Korea to go beyond its commitment last week in six-sided negotiations in Beijing to seal its main nuclear reactor and permit international inspection.
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