-- North Korea needs to respond soon on resuming six-party nuclear talks, and such a response is expected, South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon said Friday.
He said the parties cannot wait indefinitely for progress in the talks.
"It is better to set an appropriate period," he told Korean correspondents. "But I will not limit the period specifically to a few weeks or months."
The six-party talks, involving South and North Korea, the Unitd States, China, Russia and Japan, resumed in Beijing last month after being suspended for more than a year from Pyongyang's boycott. No date has yet been set on when they will meet again, but U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters Friday morning there were "signals" the talks could resume this month.
Song hoped North Korea will come back to the table with answers to the proposals the U.S. made at the last session. He described how the benefits to the North were combined and sequenced earlier as "dramatic."
"There has to be a response soon, and we expect there to be one," he said, but noted that the expectation was not based on any concrete communication from Pyongyang.
Song's Washington visit, his first as foreign minister, coincided with press reports that the North was preparing for another nuclear test. Pyongyang detonated a nuclear device on Oct.
9 and claimed it was a success, but an analysis of radioactive yield suggested it was more of a failure.
In a joint press conference earlier, Song and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said there were no indications of an imminent test but warned such an act would only deepen Pyongyang's isolation and serve no purpose.
"I don't think that from the North Korean point of view, this would seem to be a reasonable course," Rice said.
"North Korea has to know that a nuclear weapon does not guarantee its security nor help in resolving its economic problems," Song said.
The two top diplomats urged North Korea to come to the six-party negotiations ready to talk about denuclearization.
"When we think that there is some prospect of success, I think we will be prepared to return and return quickly," Rice said.
Progress at the December session was hampered mostly by Pyongyang demand that Washington must first lift punitive financial measures takes by the U.S. Treasury.
North Korea has been accused of making and circulating bogus American dollars, trafficking drugs and contraband, and laundering the profits through banks abroad, including the Banco Delta Asia (BDA) in Macau, which the Treasury designated as a primary money laundering concern abetting Pyongyang's illicit activities.
"We think that this BDA issue should be handled in parallel with the denuclearization talks," said Song.
The nuclear and financial issues should not be mixed together, he said.
"But in this regard, we still encourage the North Koreans to come along with some ideas on how to convince the others that the suspected illicit activities will not be repeated," the foreign minister said.
Officials from the Treasury and North Korea's banking sector met to discuss the BDA issue on the sidelines of the Beijing talks and agreed to convene another round this month.
The Treasury said no date has been set, but Song said at the press conference and to Korean reporters that the round will be later this month.
Washington, Jan. 5 (Yonhap News)
North Korea has to respond soon on resuming six-party talks: FM Song |
