The US yesterday said that it had failed to overcome key differences with North Korea in talks on its nuclear-weapons programs, indicating negotiations were headed for a stalemate as they dragged into a second week.
The US said it was not seeing eye-to-eye with North Korea on disarmament as it struggled to persuade the Stalinist state to abandon its nuclear-weapons programs and end a three-year standoff.
Japan said the talks, in their eighth day, were nearing "the moment of truth" and that it was up to Pyongyang to make the next move.
China has been driving the negotiations and held one-on-one talks with the US and North Korea yesterday, Xinhua news agency said, as it attempted to prevent the discussions from breaking down.
The talks -- also including Japan, South Korea and Russia -- have become bogged down in differences about what should be in a Chinese draft document aimed at establishing a framework to rid the peninsula of nuclear weapons.
"I need to be very clear that there are a lot of differences between the North Korean side on one hand and everyone else on the other hand," US envoy Christopher Hill said. "Frankly we were not able to bridge any differences. I wish I could report more progress from yesterday."
Hill said that although he saw no imminent breakthroughs, the US was committed to solving the dispute through dialogue.
"We felt the second draft was actually better than the first draft. It clearly reflected the comments of all the parties. And we continue to believe it is a basis for finding an eventual resolution," he said.
In Tokyo, Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura indicated that North Korea was rejecting US demands to commit in writing to dismantling its nuclear projects and admit to having a uranium-enrichment program.
The US accused North Korea in 2002 of running a clandestine uranium-enrichment program, something Pyongyang has always denied.
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