China’s president Hu Jintao appears to have sent a special envoy to North Korea, a former South Korean politician said today, amid speculation that the North might conduct another nuclear test.

NUCLEAR talks in Beijing ended yesterday after US officials said North Korea claimed to have nuclear weapons and might test, export or use them.

Fifty years after Washington forged an armistice with North Korea and China to end the Korean War, the three states were today trying to resolve a new regional crisis amid US claims the North wants to build nuclear arms.