South Korea welcomes the agreement reached between the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and the United States to declare and disable the DPRK's nuclear weapons programs by the end of 2007, the presidential office said Monday.

"The denuclearization agreement between the DPRK and the U.S. is a part of the ongoing Korean Peninsula peace process that would extend to the South Korea-U.S. summit, the six-party talks and the inter-Korean summit," said President Roh Moo-hyun's spokesman Cheon Ho-seon in his daily media briefing.

"The South Korean government will make full and thorough preparations for the upcoming (diplomatic) events," Cheon added.

After a two-day meeting with DPRK Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan in Geneva, Switzerland, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said Sunday that the DPRK had agreed to a timeline for its denuclearization, for the first time since the nuclear crisis erupted in late 2002.

On Friday afternoon, Roh and U.S. President George W. Bush will hold talks on the sidelines of economic leaders meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Australia's Sydney, to discuss issues related to the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asian peace.

The White House said last week that the U.S. hopes to discuss the goals of the upcoming inter-Korean summit and how it will advance the denuclearization process on the Korean Peninsula when the two heads of state meet.

Roh is scheduled to travel to Pyongyang on Oct. 2-4 for a meeting with the DPRK leader Kim Jong Il. The next full session of the six-party talks is expected to start in Beijing in mid-September.