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WASHINGTON, July 19 (Yonhap) -- The United States left North Korea off its latest list of state sponsors of terrorism Wednesday, but noted the communist country's lack of cooperation in counterterrorism efforts.
The State Department's Country Reports on Terrorism 2016 said the U.S. removed North Korea from the list in 2008 based on certification that the country had not supported international terrorism in the preceding six-month period and assurances it would not support terrorist acts in the future.
The North had been put on the list in 1988 for an airliner bombing that killed all 115 people aboard. In 2008, the designation was rescinded in exchange for progress in denuclearization talks.
Still, the U.S. redesignated North Korea in May as a country "not cooperating fully" with U.S. counterterrorism efforts, the report said.
"In making this annual determination, the Department of State reviewed the DPRK's overall level of cooperation with U.S. efforts to counterterrorism, taking into account U.S. counterterrorism objectives with the DPRK and a realistic assessment of DPRK capabilities," it said. DPRK is the acronym of North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
The report also noted the North's failure to "demonstrate meaningful progress in strengthening" its infrastructure for anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism. It recalled that the U.S. Department of the Treasury designated the North as a jurisdiction of "primary money laundering concern" in June 2016 and announced measures to further protect the U.S. financial system from abuse.
Calls have been persistent to put North Korea back on the list since it was found responsible for the cyber-attack on Sony Pictures in 2014.
The State Department has said redesignation would only be symbolic without big practical effects.
For the second year in a row, the report listed Iran, Syria and Sudan as the only three state sponsors of terrorism.
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