The US has warned it plans to pull out of talks on ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program if there is a lack of progress in the upcoming negotiations, a report said yesterday.
Washington issued the warning during a meeting with South Korea and Japan in Seoul last week, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper said, quoting Japanese government sources.
"If there is no progress at this time, [the US] will not allow talks to continue," a Japanese official was quoted as saying in the daily.
President George W. Bush's administration was likely to adopt a stronger stance against North Korea if the US withdraws from the six-party talks due to start in the final week of July, the daily said.
"The Bush administration has no plans to stay in a round of marathon talks that produce no achievement," the official was quoted as saying.
"If no end result is seen by the end of the year, the United States will likely ask concerned parties to join in taking tougher measures" against North Korea.
Reversal
After more than a year of stalemate, North Korea agreed earlier this month to return to the six-way talks, which also involve South Korea, Japan, Russia and China, Pyongyang's closest ally.
The first round of talks was held in Beijing in August 2003, nearly a year after North Korea allegedly told US officials in October 2002 it was running a uranium enrichment program.
South Korean cable news network YTN said yesterday China hopes to begin hosting the upcoming six-party talks on July 26 but the report gave no date for when the meeting would end.
Ahead of the six-way talks, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice visited China, Japan and South Korea and urged North Korea to renounce its nuclear weapons for good. The CIA believes Pyongyang has at least one or two crude nuclear bombs.
Step by step
North Korea said yesterday it won't give up nuclear weapons without receiving anything in exchange and called on the US to agree to revived arms talks to peacefully coexist with the communist state.
The North wants a step-by-step approach to weaning itself off its nuclear program, fearing it could come under attack by the US.
South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun told visiting former US Secretary of State Colin Powell that Washington's moves will be the deciding factor in resolving the latest nuclear standoff with North Korea that began in 2002.
"The United States still has the final key to the six-party talks," Roh said yesterday, according to a pool report.
Pyongyang claimed in February that it had nuclear weapons, and has since demanded the arms talks be turned into discussions that also address the alleged presence of US nuclear weapons on the peninsula -- something the US and South Korea have denied.
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