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Tuesday January 30, 11:31 AMJapan-N. Korea talks unlikely outside China proposal in 6-way talks(Kyodo) _ Japan and North Korea are unlikely to hold bilateral talks outside a China-proposed scheme to pursue working groups within the six-party framework on North Korea's nuclear ambitions, Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso said Tuesday."It will be quite difficult for Japan and North Korea to have direct talks if they are not done as one of the five working groups in the six-party talks," Aso said at a news conference, expressing hope for such scheme to push through. Aso was referring to China's proposal in the previous round of six-party talks last month to set up five working groups to promote the six-party process through the implementation of a six-party joint statement adopted in September 2005. While the details of the Chinese proposal have not been made public so far, Aso said Japan and the United States are looking at having one of the working groups handle issues between Japan and North Korea including North Korea's past abductions of Japanese nationals. A major stumbling block for Japan and North Korea to normalize bilateral ties is the abduction issue. North Korea maintains that the issue has been resolved, while Japan maintains that it has not. Expectations have been rising that the next round of six-party talks will be resumed soon and can make headway since top U.S. and North Korean nuclear negotiators met for three days in Berlin earlier this month. The six-party talks aimed at resolving North Korea's nuclear standoff reconvened last month after a 13-month hiatus but went into recess without any tangible results. A dispute over U.S. financial restrictions on a Macao-based bank suspected of laundering money and circulating counterfeit bills for North Korea blocked progress in the talks. Asked when the talks will be held, Aso said Japan and the United States are looking to Feb. 8 but that the date has yet to be officially announced by China. "I imagine six-party host China has not announced it yet because it is going through final stages of consultations with North Korea," Aso said. The six parties -- the two Koreas, Japan, Russia, China and the United States -- agreed in September 2005 to a joint statement that commits North Korea to abandon its nuclear program in exchange for aid and security assurances. Japan has repeatedly said it is meaningless to hold the six-party talks just for the sake of holding and wants North Korea to take concrete steps toward nuclear abandonment. |
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