CHINA: U.S. urges speedy conclusion to North Korea talks

The U.S. envoy to North Korean talks says it is time to wrap things up and reach a resolution but South Korean and Japanese delegates held out little hope. Envoys to the talks from North and South Korea, the United States, Russia, Japan and host China on Sunday (February 11) have agreed on most of a plan that would oblige Pyongyang to shut down nuclear activities in return for economic and security assurances. But North Korea is at odds with the other five countries over a single paragraph of the draft agreement, top U.S. envoy Christopher Hill told reporters as he headed into a fourth day of talks. "I think it's time to wrap this up and get moving. And I hope the other participants will share that view that it's really time to get thing wrapped up. We made a lot of progress. It's progress that's really consolidated. We've got this one issue that we all ought to wrap this issue up. I want to go out there today with a view that we should really really try to get this done." Christopher Hill The U.S. envoy to six-party talks , said. Hill has refused to detail exactly what is snagging negotiations but said he thought the issue was one to be discussed by experts in a working group. "I don't think our hostile policy quote on quote is an issue. First of all, we don't have a hostile policy. We just have a hostile policy to people who make weapons of destruction. And what we are trying to is to end that practice. The issue is basically so far that one paragraph and the desire to get more specificity on this paragraph that perhaps that an overall six party meeting should be trying to so but perhaps this is more appropriate for working group." he said. The row is the latest act in a long-running drama setting North Korea against the five other countries, which have urged it to end nuclear weapons ambitions that culminated in the North's first atomic test blast in October. Other diplomats have said the row is over the incentives Pyongyang would receive in return for shutting down its Yongbyon nuclear plant, which makes plutonium usable in nuclear weapons. Japan's chief negotiator, Kenichiro Sasae, sounded another bleak note, as he has in previous days. "We had numerous meetings yesterday centered around the Chinese side. The situation remains critical. There are still a lot of differences between North Korea and us. It is up to North Korea if we can move closer. Today the talks will continue but it's not positive," Sasae said. In September 2005, six-party talks agreed a joint statement sketching out the nuclear disarmament steps Pyongyang needed to take to secure fuel and economic aid, as well as political acceptance from its adversary, the United States. But the Sasae said North Korea shouldn't expect much out of it. "Rather than financial aid, I think it's mainly energy aid. I think the North Koreans are expecting too much from it." Sasae said. But that deal languished after Washington accused North Korea in late 2005 of counterfeiting U.S. currency and other illicit business. The ensuing crackdown on a bank in Macau enraged Pyongyang, which stayed away from the six-party talks until international condemnation after the nuclear test drew it back in December. Japan's Kyodo news agency said that at the latest talks North Korea had demanded energy aid equivalent to more than 2 million tonnes of fuel oil annually in exchange for the initial steps towards abandoning its nuclear weapons capability. Negotiators still hoped to agree on a joint statement and it was worth staying in China and trying to clinch the deal, Hill said, adding that he would have a bilateral meeting on Sunday with North Korea envoy Kim Kye-gwan. END

ITN Source | February 11, 2007

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