Regime raises nuclear stakes with US

SEOUL - A top Japanese official said North Korea was playing a "dangerous game" with its nuclear ambitions as a senior United States envoy flew to Seoul for talks.

Communist North Korea, suspected by the US of making nuclear bombs, yesterday became the first country to pull out of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, triggering alarm in neighbouring countries and worldwide condemnation.

Within hours it said it was free to resume missile tests, ratcheting up tension with the US in its bid to force Washington into negotiations and threatening to wipe out the world's only superpower should it bring the "dark clouds of war" to the Korean peninsula.

South Korea officials, their capital within striking range of an awesome artillery line-up, said the North was trying to hasten resolution of the nuclear standoff.

Japan's Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary, Shinzo Abe, said from Khabarovsk in Siberia that Pyongyang was "playing a dangerous game", but that the issue could be resolved through dialogue.

"If the world applies pressure and convinces North Korea that it will not gain anything with this game ... I think it is possible for the situation to return to how it was."

South Korea's Unification Ministry, meanwhile, said North Korea "apparently thinks the US is trying to buy time".

"With the statement [to pull out of the treaty], Pyongyang is saying it can't wait for Washington to come back to the table after the Iraqi dispute is settled."

After a senior North Korean official wrapped up three days of talks in New Mexico with former US Ambassador to the United Nations Bill Richardson, Washington said Pyongyang had failed to address issues of concern.

"The North Koreans told me that they don't plan to build nuclear weapons, and I took that as a positive statement," Richardson said after almost nine hours of talks with Han Song Ryol, a high-ranking member of the North Korean delegation to the United Nations.

But the Bush Administration said the Santa Fe talks had not addressed issues of concern, and warned that Pyongyang was taking steps in the wrong direction.

"While the delegates were in New Mexico, North Korea continued to take steps in the wrong direction ... that would raise tensions with the international community," State Department spokeswoman Nancy Beck said.

Richardson, who has successfully negotiated with the North Koreans in the past, said the onus was now on Pyongyang and Washington to open an official dialogue.

"Ambassador Han has expressed to me North Korea's willingness to have better relations with the US. He told me the Government of North Korea wants to resolve the nuclear issue through dialogue."

That marked little change from Pyongyang's long-stated position. And the Bush Administration - which has said it is willing to talk but not to negotiate with Pyongyang - reiterated its offer of dialogue.

Washington has sent Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly to Seoul for talks on the issue and also for meetings with other Asian nations on ways to tackle the crisis.

North Korea's UN Ambassador, Pak Gil Yon, said the US offer to hold talks without engaging in full negotiations showed a lack of sincerity.

"We still believe that the solution would be made through such negotiations if the US has a sincere attitude of such negotiations.

"But if the US continues to request or to demand its unilateral request to [North Korea] that 'You do this, or that, then we will sit with you,' this is a very, verynot sincere attitude of the US."

Pyongyang's decision to withdraw from the pivotal global treaty preventing the spread of nuclear arms has triggered suggestions the issue be placed before the UN Security Council.

But North Korea warned that any Security Council decision to punish it with sanctions would be viewed as a declaration of war.

In Pyongyang, the official news agency poured out a series of attacks against the US.

One million people turned out in the bitter winter cold to voice support for their Government, the agency said. One speaker told the rally: "If the US brings dark clouds of war to hang over this land, the Army and the people will remove the land of the US from the Earth and root out the very source of evil and war."

- REUTERS

Herald feature: North Korea