Hill-Kim Meeting Seen to Bode Well for Nuke Talks

The unannounced meeting Tuesday between the top North Korean and U.S. nuclear envoys in Beijing may signal a long-awaited breakthrough in the stalemate over Pyongyang's declaration of its nuclear arsenal, officials here said.

Adding to the upbeat prospects is the timing of the meeting. The New York Philharmonic will hold a historic concert in Pyongyang next week, an event some analysts compare to the "ping pong diplomacy" between the U.S. and China in the 1970s.

North Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan, who leads Pyongyang's nuclear negotiation team, flew to Beijing to meet with his counterpart Christopher Hill, who earlier said he had no plans for such a meeting during his ongoing regional tour.

Kim's surprise move is viewed as reflecting Pyongyang's will to continue dialogue with Washington despite the deadlock in the implementation of the six-party, deal under which the communist nation will abandon its nuclear program in exchange for energy aid and political incentives.

The agreement committed the North to disable its main nuclear reactor in Yongbyon and detail its nuclear capability by the end of last year to receive the rewards.

The disablement work is still under way, but the U.S. says Pyongyang has yet to provide a "complete and correct" list of its nuclear programs, facilities, and weapons. North Korea has claimed that it had already delivered it to the U.S. late last year.

Details on the Hill-Kim talks were not available yet. Informed sources said they discussed how to deal with the dispute over the declaration and resume the six-way talks which also involve South Korea, China, Russia, and Japan.

South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Cho Hee-yong simply referred to it as one of a variety of consultations between the related nations on advancing the denuclearization process.

Another ranking ministry official, however, was cautiously optimistic, saying the seasoned negotiators would not have held such surprise talks without the possibility of them bearing fruit.

South Korea's chief nuclear envoy Chun Yung-woo has often said that the dispute over the declaration is a tough issue but it is not insurmountable.

He cited experience of a former stumbling block _ Washington's freeze of Pyongyang's assets in a Macau bank _ which stalled the nuclear talks for a year. (Yonhap)

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