North Korea: Aid workers in North Korea have spoken of their shock at the demand of the Pyongyang regime that they leave the country by the end of the year.
There have been vague threats to kick out non-governmental organisations before, but the fact that a freshultimatum contains a firm date, December 31st, makes the NGOs believe this time it might happen.
The secretive Stalinist regime has demanded that foreign aid agencies switch from emergency food aid to longer-term development assistance.
The Irish aid agency Concern has been told its people have to leave by the end of the year, and while it is hopeful the decision can be reversed, the demand presents a major challenge to its work in North Korea.
The move is the latest twist in the increasingly knotty political situation in North Korea, one of President Bush's "Axis of Evil" states.
North Korea's economy is on the brink of bankruptcy and there are fears of a humanitarian disaster if harvests fail, as they did in 1995, and if international sanctions are imposed over Pyongyang's nuclear programme - a possible outcome should talks in Beijing fail and the issue be referred to the UN.
There are around 12 NGOs operating in North Korea, including Save the Children, Handicap International and Première Urgence.
It's a famously difficult environment to work in and aid groups are only given restricted access, which has led some groups like Oxfam to leave.
Concern's work includes irrigation schemes, forestry and wood fuel schemes, and distributing seeds and fertilizers to farms. The organisation has spent around €4 million of its own and EU money on these projects.
By far the biggest aid organisation working there is the World Food Programme, which accounts for 90 per cent of humanitarian aid funds raised for North Korea in recent years.
The WFP feeds 6.5 million of the 23 million people, and has 40 international staff members and six field offices.
Richard Ragan, country manager for the WFP, was in Beijing to talk to donor nations on the fringes of the six-nation talks, trying to convince them to continue to allow the programme to carry out development work.
"I'm optimistic the donors will come around. The WFP has saved a lot of lives and increased the health of a lot of children. There's always a chance we'll have to go. But I'm hopeful we won't have to close down," he said. The WFP argues it already has developmental components in its aid programmes, such as food for work, and the fact it runs 19 factories. Mr Ragan said it had received a letter asking it to stay.
International donations to the WFP have fallen lately because of tensions over the North's atomic weapons plan. Donor countries like the US and Japan insist that the WFP keep close tabs on where the food goes, as they do not want food aid being used to feed North Korea's huge army.
Aid sources say Pyongyang has been emboldened by bilateral aid from its richer southern neighbour. Seoul makes some contributions without strings attached, such as a need for monitoring.
