Japan, US, S. Korea to start 2-day talks on DPRK

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, September 29, 2003

Japan, US, S. Korea to start 2-day talks on DPRK

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Senior officials from Japan, the United States and South Korea will start a two-day meeting in Tokyo Monday evening to coordinate policy toward the next round of six-nation talks on DPRK's nuclear arms program.

The three countries are expected to discuss the establishment of an international inspection system to verify that DPRK is dismantling its nuclear arms program once it announces its intention to do so.

The three countries are also expected to discuss how they would respond to DPRK's security concerns and promote energy aid for the North.

The envisaged verification system involves experts from various countries, including the three nations as well as from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, Japanese officials said.

The system is aimed at achieving their goal of persuading DPRK to dismantle its nuclear arms program in a verifiable and irreversible manner, the officials said.

It will be the first policy coordination meeting among the three countries following the first round of the six-nation talks held in late August in Beijing on the DPRK nuclear standoff.

Mitoji Yabunaka, director general of the Japanese Foreign Ministry's Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs James Kelly, and South Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Lee Soo Hyuck will participate in the meeting.

The three were the chief delegates to the Beijing talks, which brought together China, Japan, DPRKh and South Korea, Russia and the U.S.

The six nations have agreed to hold a second round of talks toward a common objective of achieving a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula, though the date and venue have yet to be decided.

The three countries are not expected to compile a set of joint proposals to urge DPRK to abandon its nuclear ambitions, but they plan to separately present their own proposals in the next round of six-way talks.

They are also expected to discuss the timing of holding a meeting of executive board members of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) to make a final decision on freezing a project to construct two light-water nuclear reactors in DPRK. The three countries and the European Union are the executive board members.

The New York-based KEDO is in charge of implementing a 1994 U.S.-DPRK pact, which requires Pyongyang to freeze and eventually dismantle its weapons-grade nuclear facilities in exchange for the construction of two reactors for electricity generation and an interim supply of fuel oil.

Source: Agencies

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