US envoy Christopher Hill held consultations with China yesterday amid concerns North Korea is planning a nuclear test, as Washington works to entice the Stalinist regime back to six-party talks.
The assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific was expected to discuss ways to restart stalled multilateral talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions, a US embassy spokeswoman said.
Hill came straight from talks in Seoul and heads to Japan today before returning to South Korea for more discussions, US officials said.
"We are trying to get the six-party process going," Hill told reporters at Beijing airport. "We have got five countries that are there and one that continues to stay away, so as soon as we get the North Koreans to the talks, we look forward to vigorous negotiations."
Hill refused to put a timeframe on the resumption of talks, saying it would be easier to assess the current situation after his meetings with the Chinese side.
Chinese officials said that Hill would meet with three vice foreign ministers.
"China welcomes the visit by Mr. Hill and we are willing to exchange ideas on Sino-US relations, on the North Korean peninsula and other subjects of common interests," foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang (
"Our wish is that all relevant parties can resume the talks soon and do more to contribute to peace and stability on the North Korean peninsula," he said in response to a question on North Korea's reported nuclear weapons test.
Three rounds of the talks that include North Korea, the US, China, Russia, Japan and South Korea have been held but the process stalled last June.
Pyongyang has cited alleged US intentions to topple its government as its primary reason for pulling out of the talks, and on Feb. 10 announced that it possessed nuclear weapons.
Earlier this month, North Korea said it had shut down its nuclear power plant at Yongbyon and was preparing to reprocess the plant's spent fuel, a move that could result in the production of enough plutonium to build up to six more nuclear bombs.
En route to Brazil on Monday, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Washington was committed to the six-party talks process, but repeated that the US reserved the right to take its case to the UN Security Council.
"At this point we are committed to a course that we have described, and that is through the six-party talks to convince the North Koreans that there is really only one route to the kind of international respect that they seem to want, and that is the course that we are on," Rice said.
The New York Times reported that Washington might seek a UN resolution empowering all nations to intercept shipments in or out of North Korea that may contain nuclear materials.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
RSS