Little Headway Seen in 6-Party Talks

With Pyongyang and Washington presenting hard-line stances in a war of nerves ahead of crucial talks on North Korea's nuclear threat, experts expect negotiations to fall short of agreement on substantive issues.

They do, however, believe the sides will be able during talks a week from now to come up with a mechanism for keeping the dialogue alive.

Disputes between the two sides mostly surround North Korea's secret nuclear weapons program using highly enriched uranium, which is expected to be a decisive factor for the talks to succeed.

"I am not optimistic about the talks," said Kim Keun-sik, a professor at Kyungnam University. "Negotiations could rupture when the United States pressures the North to come clean on its uranium-based nuclear program."

Washington wants Pyongyang to address the clandestine uranium scheme it admitted to having in 2002. Though Washington insists it has hard evidence, Pyongyang vehemently denies such claims.

U.S. officials have increased their pressure on North Korea after Pakistani metallurgist Abdul Qadeer Khan said this month he sold nuclear secrets to the North.

"If the United States and the North continue to confront on the uranium issue, participants in the talks will have to be satisfied with agreeing on their next gathering or on establishing a working group for their consultations in between the talks," Kim said.

He added that Washington for political reasons would maintain its policy of dragging out a resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue until after the November presidential election.

The second round of talks will involve the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia beginning Feb. 25 in Beijing. The first round in August in Beijing ended without any progress due to the tug-of-war between North Korea and the United States.

The Washington Post reported Monday that U.S. officials would reject this time North Korea's offer to freeze its plutonium-based nuclear activities in return for economic and political concessions.

Amid rising concerns about North Korea's failure to reveal the uranium program, some South Korean officials said the countries would discuss ways to keep talks going on a regular basis.

"We decided to suggest measures to regularize six-party talks," a senior government official said on condition of anonymity. "We are currently working out details for that."

The United States has insisted on the North's voluntary revelation of its uranium use because it is difficult to locate such activity, say observers.

"It is very hard to find the uranium program unless North Korea voluntarily declares it like Libya," Deputy Foreign Minister Lee Soo-hyuck said last month.

Libya pledged in December to give up its banned weapons programs and the United States in return rapidly moved to restore bilateral relations.

"North Korea needs to make a strategic choice - and make it clear to the world as Libya has done - that it will abandon its nuclear weapons programs in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly said in Washington on Friday.

North Korea and the United States capped their first nuclear crisis in 1994 by concluding the Agreed Framework in which the North promised to freeze its nuclear activities in return for economic assistance from the U.S. side. The North has reactivated the plutonium program amid the ongoing tension.