China's nuclear envoy to visit NKorea

KOREA: China's chief nuclear negotiator is likely to visit North Korea later Monday in an attempt to persuade it to return to six-nation nuclear disarmament talks, South Korean media reports said.

"Chances are high that Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei will fly to Pyongyang on an Air China flight that departs at 5:20 pm (0920 GMT)," Yonhap news agency quoted a diplomatic source as saying. Wu will try to persuade the North to come back to the talks which also involve South Korea, the United States, Russia and Japan, the source said.

Hankyoreh newspaper said Wu would leave Monday and stay a week in the North. South Korean officials were not available for comment.

China has hosted the talks, which began in 2003 and reached a deal under which the North would scrap its nuclear weapons in return for energy aid and major diplomatic and security benefits.

But Pyongyang announced on April 14 it would quit the forum and restart its atomic weapons programme in protest at the United Nations Security Council's condemnation of its rocket launch earlier that month.

On May 25 it staged a nuclear test, its second since 2006. Washington has since then led a drive for tougher enforcement of UN sanctions. In signs of a possible easing of tensions, former US president Bill Clinton went to Pyongyang this month to meet leader Kim Jong-Il and win a pardon for two American journalists. Washington said officials had indicated to Clinton that they want better relations.

The hardline communist state says it wants direct talks with the United States. Washington says this is possible but only alongside six-party negotiations. Last week the North freed a South Korean worker it had detained for over four months.

Earlier Monday it announced it would resume cross-border tours, ease restrictions on frontier crossings and restart reunions for separated families.

Seoul, Monday, AFP