South and North Korea agreed to resume high-level talks

SEOUL - South and North Korea agreed Thursday to resume high-level reconciliation talks next month but failed to reach a breakthrough in efforts to get the Stalinist country back to nuclear disarmament talks.
The two Koreas agreed to hold cabinet-level talks on June 21-24 in Seoul, they said in a statement which wrapped up the first inter-Korean talks in 10 months.
The South agreed to give 200,000 tonnes of fertilizer to the North beginning May 21, and to dispatch a delegation for ceremonies in Pyongyang in June to mark the fifth anniversary of an inter-Korean summit on June 15, 2000.
The summit prompted a series of inter-Korean reconciliation events, followed by 14 rounds of ministerial talks, but North Korea boycotted inter-Korean talks last summer amid tension over its nuclear weapons drive.
"Both sides ... agree to make joint efforts for the improvement of their relations and peace on the Korean peninsula," the statement said.
But it made no mention of Pyongyang`s nuclear ambitions, despite hectic efforts by South Korea to win a promise from North Korea to return to six-party talks aimed at ending its nuclear program.
The agreement came at talks between South and North Korean vice ministers which began on Monday at Kaesong City near the inter-Korean border.
South Korean officials said earlier their repeated calls for North Korea to rejoin the stalled six-party nuclear talks had gone unanswered.
But after the agreement was reached Seoul`s chief delegate, Rhee Bong-Jo, adopted a positive tone.
"South and North Korea actively expressed their strong will for the resolution of the nuclear issue," Rhee Bong-jo, the chief South Korean negotiator, told reporters.
A senior government official said the comment on joint efforts for peace on the Korean peninsula was a veiled reference to the nuclear standoff.
"This is Pyongyang`s way of hinting that the nuclear issue is in there," the official said.
Pyongyang has boycotted the six-way talks since the third round in June in Beijing last year.
US officials have warned that Washington and its allies are losing patience with North Korea`s refusal to return to dialogue, hinting that Pyongyang could be referred to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions.
North Korea has said it would consider sanctions a declaration of war.
The inter-Korean talks followed the first direct contact between US and North Korean officials in nearly half a year via Pyongyang`s UN mission in New York.
A US embassy official in Tokyo said "working-level contact" took place last week. "As previously, this channel is used to convey messages about US policy, not to negotiate," the official said.
Joseph DeTrani, the US special envoy for the six-party talks, told North Korea that Washington recognizes Pyongyang as a sovereign state and had no intention of attacking it, the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun said.
DeTrani suggested that Washington was willing to normalize ties with Pyongyang if it gave up its nuclear ambitions, it said.
The meeting was attended by Pak Kil-Yon, the North Korean ambassador to the United Nations, and his deputy Han Song-Ryol, according to the Japanese daily.
The inter-Korean meeting came amid growing concerns that the North might carry out a nuclear weapon test. North Korea said in February it possessed nuclear weapons.
The decision to ship 200,000 tonnes of fertilizer to North Korea came in response to Pyongyang`s request for 500,000 tonnes earlier this year.
Fertilizer aid is crucial for the impoverished communist state where, according to the UN World Food Program, severe food shortages are escalating to crisis levels.
The UN agency warned it had been forced to halt various food supplies to large numbers of the 6.5 million beneficiaries in North Korea classed as most vulnerable due to the lack of large donations.

05/19/2005 14:15 GMT