Seoul - North Korea said Tuesday it had stopped disabling its nuclear facilities in protest of the United States' failure to remove the country from its terrorist blacklist.

The foreign ministry in Pyongyang accused Washington of not having kept its side of a deal struck to end North Korea's nuclear weapons programme.

North Korea therefore decided to halt disabling its nuclear facilities, a ministry spokesman was quoted as saying by the official Central News Agency.

"We have decided to immediately suspend disabling our nuclear facilities," the spokesman said, adding that the measure has been effective as of August 14.

According to news reports, Pyongyang also considered restoring its nuclear facilities at Yongbyong to its original state, thereby retreating from its promise to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions.

In a deal struck in the six-party talks with participation of Russia, China, South Korea, Japan and the United States, North Korea in June provided a detailed list of its nuclear facilities and stockpile.

The United States vowed to remove the communist state from its list of countries sponsoring terrorism, but demanded the North to agree to a more stringent verification process before doing so. (dpa)