US:The US and North Korea held a second day of unprecedented talks yesterday, raising hopes of a breakthrough in efforts to curb the communist state's nuclear weapons programme.
Envoys from the two sides, who met for six hours on Tuesday and another 1½ hours yesterday, were planning to hold a third round of discussions in the German capital today, said US assistant secretary of state Christopher Hill.
However, US state department spokesman Tom Casey later said in Washington that he did not expect Mr Hill to meet the North Koreans again in Berlin or in Seoul, Beijing or Tokyo - the next stops during his current trip.
"Our expectation . . . is that this meeting he had today [ would] be the last session that he would have on this trip with the North Koreans," Mr Casey said.
The bilateral talks were the first outside the framework of six-country negotiations in Beijing, which began in 2003 to try to stop North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions.
US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, in Berlin for meetings with German chancellor Angela Merkel and foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, said Mr Hill's discussions were aimed at preparing for the six- party talks.
"We want to make sure that the next round of six-party talks is fully prepared so that we can make progress there," she said.
"[ This] should help to prepare the way for a more favourable atmosphere at the time of the resumption of the six-party talks, which we hope would be soon."
A US state department official said he was hopeful these talks could begin by the end of the month or soon afterwards.
Officials said Washington's willingness to talk directly with Pyongyang - as North Korea has long demanded - suggests it may be ready to compromise over a crackdown on North Korea's finances, despite a nuclear test by Pyongyang last October.
Russia's new chief negotiator at the six-party talks put pressure on Washington to scrap its financial penalties. "The United States should make some steps towards the [ North] Koreans by lifting financial sanctions," said Alexander Losyukov.
Mr Hill met his North Korean counterpart, Kim Kye-gwan, at the latter's embassy in Berlin but declined to comment when he left. Earlier, he had said he hoped the six-party talks would resume in January. But he indicated that Pyongyang had still not made a decision to abandon its arsenal.
Mr Hill declined to give details of the substance of Tuesday's talks but described them as "useful discussions". He also played down suggestions that the bilateral talks might strike a deal.
"It's very important that any negotiating or deal-making needs to be done in the six-party process," he said.
Several officials in Washington said they believed the Bush administration was inclined to resolve the dispute over North Korea's accounts at a Macau bank, which it has called "a willing pawn" in North Korea's illicit financial deals.
South Korean foreign minister Song Min-soon said the meeting should bring the two sides closer to implementing a deal to end Pyongyang's nuclear arms programme struck in September 2005. In that agreement, hammered out in talks with South Korea, the US, Japan, Russia and China, Pyongyang agreed to trade its nuclear arms for economic aid and security guarantees.
The talks were later bogged down over Pyongyang's complaint that a US squeeze on its financial activities was proof that Washington remained hostile to its leaders. Washington has since agreed to meet North Korean officials separately on the financial crackdown and may agree to the release of some of the frozen funds, which are controlled by Macau authorities, officials said.
US and North Korean finance officials are due to resume their talks next week in either New York or Beijing, Mr Hill said. - (Reuters)