Obama envoy says he shared ‘common understanding’ with NKorea on need for nuclear-free Koreas

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US envoy cites ‘common understanding’ with NKorea

SEOUL, South Korea — President Barack Obama’s envoy on North Korea said Thursday that officials in Pyongyang agreed on the need to resume nuclear disarmament talks but did not say when they would return to the negotiating table.

Stephen Bosworth sounded a hopeful note, calling his three-day visit to North Korea “very useful” and citing a “common understanding” with his North Korean counterparts on the importance of the denuclearization process.

The six-nation talks have been stalled for more than a year, during which time the reclusive communist regime has conducted a nuclear test and ballistic missile test-launches, and claimed it restarted its atomic program.

“It is certainly our hope, based on these discussions in Pyongyang, that the six-party talks can resume expeditiously and that we can get back to the important work of denuclearization,” Bosworth told a news conference in Seoul after returning from Pyongyang.

The veteran diplomat’s talks in North Korea were the first high-level contact between Washington and Pyongyang since Obama took office in January pledging to reach out to former adversaries.

Six nations — the two Koreas, the U.S., Russia, Japan and China — had been negotiating since 2003 on a step-by-step process to dismantle North Korea’s nuclear program.

North Korea walked away from those talks earlier this year in anger over the international criticism of its ambitions to develop rocket technology, widely seen as a test its long-range missile delivery system.

After months of rising tensions and inflammatory rhetoric, North Korea began reaching out to the U.S. and other participants in the six-party talks in recent months.

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton traveled to the reclusive nation in August on a private humanitarian mission to negotiate the release of two detained American journalists. He sat for three hours with Kim Jong Il — the North Korean leader’s first public appearance with a high-profile figure in a year — in a meeting that appeared to break the ice between the two nations, which do not have diplomatic ties.

Bosworth said Thursday that he did not request a meeting or meet with Kim Jong Il. North Korea’s state media said Kim was traveling outside Pyongyang during the three days of Bosworth’s visit.

He said he met with Kang Sok Ju, the first vice foreign minister considered Kim’s chief foreign policy strategist, and top nuclear envoy Kim Kye Gwan.

Bosworth characterized the “candid” discussions as “exploratory talks” rather than negotiations, and said he did not succeed in gaining Pyongyang’s firm commitment on returning to the disarmament talks.

It “remains to be seen when and how the DPRK will return to the six-party talks,” he said, referring to North Korea by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. “This is something that will require further consultations among all six of us.”

But he added, “there is a common understanding” on the need to resume the disarmament process.

Bosworth said he conveyed Obama’s message stressing the importance of the need for a “complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”

“As President Obama has made clear, the United States is prepared to work with our allies and partners in the region to offer North Korea a different future,” Bosworth said.

“The path for North Korea to realize this future is to choose the door of dialogue in the six-party talks and to take irreversible steps to achieve the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”

Bosworth was accompanied by chief U.S. nuclear negotiator Sung Kim, as well as atomic and Asia specialists from the Defense Department and the White House. The delegation heads Friday to China, Japan and Russia to brief the six-party partners.

Associated Press writer Jae-soon Chang contributed to this report.