North Korea agrees to talks with the South

North Korea today agreed to Cabinet-level talks with South Korea to discuss international fears over its nuclear programme.

Pyongyang said it wanted the talks held on January 21-24, a week later than the South had proposed.

The meeting would be the first high level communication between the two since the communist regime revealed its secret weapons programme in October.

Meanwhile, other countries pushed hard for a diplomatic solution.

France’s foreign minister was in Beijing petitioning China – one of North Korea’s few remaining allies.

French President Jacques Chirac has said the reclusive North has “no other choice” but to abandon its nuclear programme.

Japan’s prime minister also left today for Russia, another Pyongyang ally.

Although it says it is willing to talk with the South, the North has not yet replied to a separate offer for dialogue with the United States.

Pyongyang has accused America of plotting to attack it, and “increasing the danger of a nuclear war on the Korean Peninsula”.

Washington had said it would not talk to North Korea until it scrapped its nuclear weapons programme. It has denied having plans for military action against the North.

On Sunday, US Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly arrives for talks in Seoul before heading to China and Japan.

South Korean National Security Adviser Yim Sung-joon, currently in Washington, said a strong US-South Korean alliance should form the basis of any resolution of the stand-off.

He added that South Korea wants to defuse tensions before outgoing President Kim Dae-jung leaves office late next month.

North Korea alarmed the world by taking steps in December to reactivate nuclear facilities frozen under a deal with Washington in 1994.

The country has since expelled UN monitors and threatened to quit the global nuclear arms control treaty. The UN International Atomic Energy Agency this week gave the North “one more chance” to honour its international obligations.

Separately, Red Cross officials from both Koreas today agreed to hold talks this month on more family reunions and the establishment of a permanent reunion centre for families separated before and during the 1950-53 Korean War.

The two sides agreed to hold working-level talks at the North’s Diamond Mountain resort on January 20-22, South Korea’s Red Cross said. The talks will try to establish a date for the next round of actual reunions.