China says 6-way N.Korea talks to resume, progress

By Elaine Lies

TOKYO (Reuters) – Six-party talks aimed at dismantling
North Korea’s nuclear weapons program may resume on September 2
and are likely to make more progress than the previous round,
China’s top envoy to the forum was quoted as saying on
Thursday.

“The talks could resume from September 2,” visiting Chinese
Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei was quoted by Mizuho Fukushima,
leader of Japan’s Social Democratic Party, as telling her in a
meeting.

Fukushima told Reuters that Wu also said: “I think there
will be more progress than before.”

Wu is to visit Pyongyang soon, Fukushima said without
elaborating, adding that Wu had given her no further details
about the talks, including whether the United States and North
Korea had agreed to start the talks on September 2.

“He said the various countries are making efforts regarding
the talks, and so for that reason more progress is likely than
in previous rounds,” Fukushima said.

Following a gap of more than a year, the parties — the two
Koreas, the United States, Japan, China and Russia — met in
Beijing for nearly two weeks before breaking off earlier this
month with a decision to reconvene during the week of August
29.

A spokesman for the South Korean Foreign Ministry said he
anticipated that the talks would begin next week, likely in the
second half of the week, but that no firm date had been set.

A North Korean diplomatic source in Beijing, however, was
quoted by Interfax as saying the talks are unlikely to resume
next week.

“In our opinion, there is little chance that the fourth
round of the six-way talks could be resumed next week,” the
unnamed source said.

Wu met Japanese officials on Wednesday but had only said
the talks would likely resume next week as planned, stopping
short of giving a specific date.

“All I can say for now is that we are still discussing the
opening of the meeting to be held sometime in the week of
August 29 … No specific date has been set at the moment,”
Tomohiko Taniguchi, deputy press secretary at Japan’s Foreign
Ministry, told a news conference.

There has been a flurry of diplomatic activity ahead of the
planned resumption of talks, including contacts between U.S.
and North Korean officials, in a bid to avoid another
breakdown.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Korean
Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon discussed the six-party talks on
Tuesday in Washington, and Japan’s representative to the forum
flies to the United States on Thursday for a meeting with his
U.S. counterpart.

On Wednesday, a senior South Korean official said he was
optimistic about prospects for a deal by which the North would
abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions, because Pyongyang has
been presented with Washington’s best-ever offer.

“There has never been a more positive signal in 50 years
than what the United States has offered the North,” South
Korean Vice Foreign Minister Lee Tae-sik told a forum in Seoul.

“The United States has promised normalization of relations
in return for North Korea giving up all its nuclear programs. I
think there will be some good result soon,” he said.

In a sign that the U.S. position was softening ahead of the
planned resumption of talks, Assistant Secretary of State
Christopher Hill, the top U.S. negotiator, said on Tuesday the
issue of the North having a civilian nuclear plan was a
“theoretical, downstream” issue that would not break a deal.

North Korea’s insistence on the right to have a civilian
nuclear program was the key sticking point in the last round of
talks, at which the parties failed to agree to a joint
statement.

U.S. officials have been skeptical about allowing North
Korea to pursue a nuclear program for energy production out of
concern that it might be used for military purposes.