Kim sets terms for 6-nation crisis talks

Kim’s position on China’s proposal for urgent talks among the chief delegates to the stalled six-party talks on North Korea’s denuclearisation was conveyed to Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo during his December 8-9 visit to Pyongyang as part of China’s diplomatic efforts to ease tensions on the peninsula, sources said on Tuesday.

China’s proposal has met with a less-than-enthusiastic response in Washington, Seoul and Tokyo, which want North Korea to first cease its provocative actions and take positive steps toward denuclearisation.

But the sources said Kim rejected such imposition of conditions for the China-proposed six-way crisis talks.

Earlier on Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu Jiang told reporters at a regular press briefing that in Dai’s meetings in Pyongyang, the North Korean side reacted with a “positive attitude” to China’s proposal.

Dai travelled to the North Korea’s capital amid heightened tensions in the wake of its deadly shelling of a South Korean island on November 23 and the revelation that the North has completed a new uranium enrichment facility at its Yongbyon nuclear complex. Since those developments, China has been under strong pressure to rein in its traditional ally.