The New York Philharmonic played a concert in Pyongyang in February 2008. It was the first time an American cultural group performed in the country and the largest American delegation to visit North Korea since the Korean War. The orchestra played pieces by Dvorak, Gershwin, and Wagner, as well as the “Star-Spangled Banner” and a traditional Korean folk song.
Hopes for an eventual denuclearized North Korea were raised again in May 2008, when the country turned over to U.S. officials about 18,000 pages of documents detailing its efforts in 1990, 2003, and 2005 to reprocess plutonium for nuclear weapons. It did not, however, hand over information on its uranium program and its efforts to sell nuclear material. The country went further in June, when it turned over to China a list of its nuclear facilities as well as information on the amount of reprocessed plutonium in its possession and destroyed a cooling tower at its main reactor in Yongbyon. The U.S. in turn said it would remove North Korea from its list of countries that sponsor terrorism and lifted some sanctions against the country. In July, the U.S., China, North Korea, South Korea, Russia, and Japan announced another deal that will have international inspectors visiting North Korea’s nuclear facilities to confirm that it has shut down its main processing facility at Yongbyon. In return, North Korea will receive financial and energy assistance.
The progress reached in the summer toward denuclearizing North Korea seemed to have ground to a halt by September as officials said they planned to restart the plutonium reprocessing plant at Yongbyon and banned UN inspectors from the plant. The move followed complaints by North Korean officials that the U.S. had not removed the country from its list of countries that sponsor terrorism and reports that President Kim had suffered a debilitating stroke, leaving many to wonder who is calling the shots in the reclusive country. The diplomatic roller coaster continued its unpredictable course in October, when the U.S. State Department removed North Korea from its list of state sponsors of terrorism after North Korea agreed to give international inspectors access to its nuclear plant at Yonbyon and to continue disabling its plutonium-processing facility.
Source: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/north-korea