International Atomic Energy Agency Deputy Director Olli Heinonen announced the tentative deal Friday after wrapping up a visit to the North, which included the U.N. nuclear watchdog's first trip to the Yongbyon reactor since inspectors were expelled from the country in 2002.

Heinonen said Saturday upon arrival in Beijing that North Korea and the five other countries involved in international talks on dismantling Pyongyang's nuclear programs should meet next to discuss technical details of the shut down and related deliveries of economic aid.

"The next logical step is that they talk with each other and agree on technical arrangements," Heinonen said. "The IAEA doesn't have any role in that."

He also reiterated the announcement made earlier in Pyongyang that the IAEA and North Korea had "reached an understanding on how we are going to monitor the sealing and shutting down of the Yongbyon facility."

North Korean state media had no immediate comment.

It was the latest sign that the North is taking seriously a February pledge to shut down and disable the 5-megawatt reactor, which can produce enough plutonium to churn out one nuclear bomb a year.

Pyongyang was promised economic aid and political concessions from the U.S., China, Japan, Russia and South Korea _ its partners in the so-called six-party forum created in 2003 to achieve the North's de-nuclearization in return for giving up the reactor.

Efforts to halt Pyongyang's nuclear program took on added urgency after the North carried out its first atomic test explosion last October.

Implementation of the February accord, however, was delayed amid a financial dispute between Washington and Pyongyang over North Korean funds frozen in a Macau bank due to U.S. allegations of money laundering and other wrongdoing.

Difficulties in resolving the issue resulted in the North ignoring an April deadline to close the reactor.

But progress toward a solution spurred Pyongyang to invite the inspectors on June 16.

The financial dispute was declared resolved Monday, and the four-member IAEA group arrived in Pyongyang on Tuesday to discuss how the agency would monitor and verify a shutdown.

Heinonen said his team was preparing to report to the IAEA board of governors within a week.

He said, however, that the agency would have no say in the shutdown's timing.

"This is for the six parties to decide," he told the broadcaster APTN on Friday in Pyongyang. "You have to ask them the time scale. When they do (decide), we will be ready."

The U.S. State Department said in a statement Friday that it welcomed news of the IAEA visit, and was waiting for a briefing from U.N. officials on the trip.

"We look forward to the early shutdown and seal of the Yongbyon nuclear facility and to implementing all other commitments" from the February agreement to shut down the reactor, said spokeswoman Janelle Hironimus.