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N Korea talks 'positive'
22/06/2007 12:03 - (SA)
Beijing - US nuclear envoy Christopher Hill said on Friday he had positive meetings with senior North Korean officials during a visit to Pyongyang, and disarmament talks would resume soon, Chinese state press said.
"It's (been) a very good discussion and on the way forward and the need to move forward," said Hill, according to the Xinhua news agency, adding that "all aspects of the six-party talks process" were discussed during the trip.
Hill said he met with the North's Foreign Minister, Pak Ui-Chun, and Kim Kye-Gwan, Pyongyang's chief envoy to the six-party talks.
The six-nation talks are aimed at ending the Stalinist state's nuclear weapons programme in return for aid and international recognition.
"I think we're talking about trying to have a six-party meeting as soon as possible," Hill told Xinhua at the airport before heading to Seoul as part of his east Asian tour to try and instill momentum in the six-party process.
He did not specify a date for the resumption of formal talks, which also involve China, Russia, Japan and South Korea.
Hill said the United States was looking for a "comprehensive solution" to both the shutting down of the North's nuclear facilities and the normalisation of diplomatic ties between the two nations.
His trip was the first to North Korea by a top State Department official since October 2002, when his predecessor James Kelly confronted the North with alleged evidence of a secret nuclear programme using highly enriched uranium.
That accusation, and the North's denial, triggered off the latest nuclear crisis and the collapse of a 1994 bilateral denuclearisation accord.
Inspectors from the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency are due to visit Pyongyang next week to discuss shutting down its Yongbyon plant, which produces the raw material for bomb-making plutonium.
- AFP
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