Sung Kim, director of the Office of Korean Affairs

The U.S. State Department's top Korean expert will travel to NorthKorea for this week's planned destruction of the cooling tower at theregime's main Yongbyon nuclear complex.

A spokesman for the U.S. embassy in South Korea says Sung Kim will cross the inter-Korean border on Thursday.

Theisolated regime has invited media organizations from the othercountries in the disarmament talks - the United States, China,Russia, Japan and South Korea - to provide live television coverage ofthe tower's destruction.

Pyongyang is expected to hand overits long-awaited nuclear declaration on Thursday to Chinese negotiators - six months after it had agreed to do so, in exchange for diplomaticbenefits and energy aid.

After it hands over itsdeclaration, the United States is expected to begin the process ofdropping North Korea from a terrorism blacklist.

ChristopherHill, the chief American envoy to the talks, says the declaration willoutline North Korea's nuclear programs, but will not provide detailsabout its nuclear weapons.

The envoy says the accounting ofthe regime's nuclear weapons will be determined in the next phase oftalks. He says that phase will begin as the United States works toverify the declaration.

Hill is scheduled to travel Wednesday to Japan, where he will join U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP and.