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North Korean nuke talks close to stalemate

US and North Korean negotiators met yesterday as the top US envoy warned "not enough progress" had been made in marathon talks aimed at convincing Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear programs.

As the talks entered a 12th day, the process appeared deadlocked over North Korea's insistence that it retain the right to operate nuclear programs for peaceful purposes.

Washington is demanding that North Korea give up all its nuclear programs, not just its weapons capability, to defuse a crisis that has rumbled on for nearly three years.

The two sides' top delegates met in another one-on-one meeting yesterday, one of several in the past few days, sources said. They also met separately with host nation China, Chinese state-run television said.

Chief US delegate Christopher Hill indicated that his patience was running out and that the talks could end soon.

"If we're not going to make progress, we're not going to be here," Hill told reporters as he left his hotel for a meeting with the Chinese delegation, which was to be followed by the talks with the North Koreans.

"If we're not going to be here ... we'll have to talk about what possible way we might wind this up," Hill said.

But Hill and South Korean chief delegate Song Min-soon rejected the idea of suspending the talks for a recess, with Hill saying he still hoped to gain ground yesterday.

"A recess is one of the sort of termination scenarios. It's definitely an idea which we don't want to do," Hill said. "There has been progress in this and we don't want to have that progress slip away ... We've been rolling this rock up the hillside and we don't want it to roll all the way back down."

Song said that while progress was made on some issues, the "tense" talks were not making headway because of hurdles over several important issues. He said late on Friday that the US and North Korea were "evenly stubborn."
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