North Korea pledges to denuclearise

North Korea's number two leader reiterated today his country's pledge to abandon its nuclear weapons, as the impoverished nation sought a resumption of aid at its first high-level talks with South Korea since conducting an atomic test.

Kim Yong Nam said "the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula is the dying wish" of the country's founding president, Kim Il Sung, the father of current leader Kim Jong Il.

North Korea "will make efforts to realize it", he told South Korean Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung in Pyongyang, the North's capital.

Lee pressed for North Korea to follow through on its breakthrough February 13 agreement with the US and four other countries to shut down its sole operating nuclear reactor in 60 days, and to eventually dismantle all its atomic programs.

"It is important to make efforts to ensure that South and North Korea cooperate and six countries each assume their responsibilities," Lee said.

Kim Yong Nam also called for the two Koreas to work together to reunify the peninsula, which was divided after World War II and remains officially at war since the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty.

South Korea has been one of the North's main aid sources since the two nations held their first and only summit in 2000. This week's meetings are the 20th Cabinet-level talks since then.

But South Korea halted rice and fertiliser shipments to the North after it test-fired a barrage of missiles last July, and relations worsened following the North's October 9 underground nuclear test.

The provocations were the most serious challenge yet to South Korea's "sunshine" policy of engagement with its long-time foe, which has been criticised by conservatives for helping prop up the North's totalitarian regime without requiring reforms or disarmament.

South Korea has appeared hesitant at this week's talks, which run through Friday, to immediately restart aid without seeing the North take real steps to dismantle its nuclear program.

Today a South Korean official said a draft agreement between the two sides "does not specifically mention rice and fertiliser aid".

The official did not give his name due to the sensitivity of the continuing talks.

But the North's main negotiator at the talks, senior cabinet councillor Kwon Ho Ung, said "a wide road will be opened for the drastic development of North-South relations" if certain measures are implemented. He did not specify them.

Last month's six-nation nuclear agreement has raised hopes it will foster a relaxation of regional tensions, since the deal also provides for North Korea to hold talks to normalise ties with Japan and the US, both of which are scheduled to begin next week.

The nuclear pact also calls for negotiations to finally establish a peace agreement between the Koreas.

South Korea's President Roh Moo-hyun urged in a speech Thursday in Seoul that the agreement "be successfully implemented so that a peace regime can be firmly established on the Korean peninsula".

Amid intense diplomacy to ensure the disarmament deal goes forward, the US State Department's number two diplomat, John Negroponte, arrived in Japan on the first stop of an Asian trip expected to focus on the North Korea issue. He will also visit South Korea and China.

Meanwhile, South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon left for Washington for talks with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on North Korea. He is also set to travel to Moscow.