N Korea returning to talks
2006-10-31 17:14
Washington - North Korea has agreed to
return to six-party talks and Washington hopes a new round will
be held before year's end, a senior US official said on
Tuesday.
The official confirmed that US envoy Chris Hill had met
in Beijing with North Korean and Chinese counterparts and the
North Koreans had "agreed to return to talks."
"Chris had a trilat (meeting) in Beijing with Chinese and
DPRK representatives. They agreed to return to talks. We hope
for a resumption date before the end of the year," he told
Reuters.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said
that implementation of UN sanctions, imposed earlier this
month after Pyongyang had conducted its first nuclear test,
would continue.
Six-party talks, involving the United States, South Korea,
Japan, Russia, China and North Korea, have been deadlocked for
a year over Pyongyang's objections to a US crackdown on its
international financial assets.
The Bush administration had internally debated compromise
proposals that would give the North a face-saving away out of
this controversy but it was unknown if that was part of the
agreement that caused Pyongyang to agree to return to talks.
Another senior official who spoke to Reuters on Monday had
ruled out any special inducements on this point. He stressed
that the United States had said for some time that if the North
returned to negotiations, the issue of Pyongyang's frozen
financial assets could be discussed in that context.