By Kim Sue-young
Staff Reporter
The United States rejected North Korea's call for holding talks on a peace treaty, Tuesday, and instead urged the secretive state to first return to the six-party talks.
North Korea watchers said that Pyongyang was seemingly attempting to win a head start in future negotiations over denuclearization.
"It appears that North Korea is trying to justify its return to the six-party talks and at the same time, distract the focus from denuclearization by proposing talks on a peace treaty," Professor Yang Moo-jin at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul said.
Professor Kim Yong-hyun at Dongguk University said, "The North is seemingly aiming at making the peace treaty issue a major part of the denuclearization talks and seeking an advantageous position," he said. "It is not seen as positive."
Kim also said that the six-way talks would be negatively affected if North Korea continues to exclude South Korea from negotiations on a peace treaty.
The South Korean government has yet to make an official announcement regarding the North Korean proposal made Monday to replace the present armistice agreement with a peace treaty.
Senior officials said they remain skeptical toward Pyongyang's real intentions.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley said Tuesday, "We've made clear going back several months, we are not going to pay North Korea for coming back to the six-party process."
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs urged North Korea to rejoin the multilateral forum, saying, "The North Koreans are well aware of what they need to do to come back to six-party talks in dealing with this issue."
Pyongyang has suggested commencing talks with concerned parties for a peace treaty, possibly within the context of the stalled six-way talks.
It did not state whether South Korea should be included in the discussions, though.
The Korean War (1950-53) ended in an armistice as the U.S.-led United Nations Command, North Korea and China signed the accord.
North Korea called for a peace treaty, even before U.S. special envoy Stephen Bosworth visited the isolated state last month, in an apparent attempt to secure its regime.