U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell says North Korea may be ready to resume multi-party talks to defuse a crisis over its nuclear ambitions.

Mr. Powell told reporters en route to Chile for the APEC summit that the United States has seen signals coming out of North Korea where it said it never insisted the crisis be solved only through negotiations with the United States.

Earlier U.S. officials said Washington plans to take advantage of the summit, which begins Saturday, to discuss with China, Japan, South Korea and Russia ways of getting Pyongyang back to the negotiating table.

The six countries have held three rounds of talks on North Korea's nuclear ambitions.

North Korea refused to attend a fourth round of talks planned for September because, experts believe, it was awaiting the outcome of the U.S. presidential election.