North wants six-way talks after meeting on sanctions

BEIJING (Kyodo) North Korea wants to resume the six-party talks on its nuclear programs soon after it holds a meeting later this month with Washington on U.S. financial sanctions, a senior lawmaker of the Liberal Democratic Party said Saturday after a visit to Pyongyang.

Taku Yamasaki KYODO PHOTO

Taku Yamasaki, who spent five days in North Korea, said at a news conference in Beijing that officials also told him that whether Pyongyang will go ahead with a second nuclear test depends on how the U.S. acts.

Yamasaki said he met with a number of officials from the government as well as the ruling Workers' Party of Korea, including Song Il Ho, North Korea's ambassador in charge of diplomatic normalization talks with Japan.

Yamasaki declined to identify the others he met, saying he agreed with North Korea not to divulge their names.

He said he and Song shared the view that the six-party talks aimed at ending the nuclear standoff should resume "immediately after" the financial talks with the United States are held.

Yamasaki quoted Song as saying the meeting will be held Jan. 22.

The dispute over U.S. financial restrictions on a Macau-based bank suspected of laundering money and circulating counterfeit bills for North Korea has blocked progress in the six-party talks, which resumed in December after a 13-month hiatus but ended without making any headway.

The talks involve the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia.

Yamasaki said that while he urged North Korea not to carry out a second nuclear test, Song replied that whether it will do so is "up to U.S. actions."

The Diet maker said other officials he met in Pyongyang expressed the same view, and that personally he believes North Korea had no immediate plan to conduct another blast.

North Korea staged its first nuclear test in October. The experiment triggered international condemnation and a U.N. Security Council resolution that paved the way for economic and diplomatic sanctions against the country.

Song, meanwhile, complained bitterly about Japan's unilateral sanctions against the country for its nuclear test and for missile test launches in July, and said Pyongyang currently has no plans to restart bilateral talks for normalizing diplomatic relations with Japan, according to Yamasaki.

Song called the sanctions "severe discrimination" against North Korea and indicated the bilateral talks will not resume until the sanctions are lifted, Yamasaki said.

In addition to the sanctions under the U.N. resolution, Japan has carried out unilateral measures that include a ban on all imports and on North Korean nationals from entering Japan.

Song, however, confirmed that a 2002 bilateral declaration on agreeing to work toward normalizing ties and solve outstanding problems remains intact, according to Yamasaki.

Among the major disputes between the two countries is one over Japanese nationals abducted by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s.