Russia said a North Korean diplomat proposed a new format today for talks to resolve the impasse on the North's nuclear program, including all six nations with the most at stake in the crisis.
The Russian foreign ministry said North Korea's ambassador to Moscow had told it Pyongyang, until now bent on talks with Washington alone, now favored six-sided talks, including Russia, to resolve the nuclear row.
The ministry said envoy Pak Ui-chun made the new offer in a meeting with Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov today.
It did not list the countries but they appeared to be North and South Korea, China, Japan, the United States and Russia.
"On behalf of his leadership, the ambassador said that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea favors holding six-sided talks with Russia's participation on settling the current difficult situation on the Korean peninsula and is undertaking active efforts for them to take place," the statement said.
There was an initial, inconclusive round of three-way talks in Beijing in April at which the North told the United States it had nuclear weapons and was seeking to make more.
A White House spokesman reacted cautiously to the report. "We hope that North Korea is willing to agree to multilateral talks," said White House spokesman Mr Scott McClellan. "We've been in close contact with our friends and allies and we'll see where this takes us. We'll see whether this moves us forward."