Top nuclear envoys from the United States and South Korea held talks
Saturday on ways to bring North Korea back to disarmament negotiations,
a day after the North claimed to have succeeded in enriching uranium.
Stephen
Bosworth, the U.S. special representative on North Korea, met with Wi
Wung-Lac, South Korea's chief nuclear negotiator, in Seoul.
Bosworth
did not comment on details of the meeting, pending a press briefing on
Sunday. But South Korea's state-run news agency Yonhap quoted an
official as saying the nuclear envoys discussed a joint response to
North Korea's recent nuclear threats and conciliatory gestures.
On
Friday, North Korea said it has reached the last stage of enriching
uranium, a process which, if completed, would give it a second means of
building a nuclear bomb.
In a letter to the United Nations
Security Council, North Korea's U.N. ambassador, Sin Son Ho, said
Pyongyang also is continuing to weaponize plutonium.
The
ambassador said North Korea is prepared for both sanctions and
dialogue, adding that if some permanent Security Council members decide
to seek further sanctions against the North as a first step, it will
bolster its nuclear deterrence first and think about resuming talks
afterwards.
South Korea's Foreign Ministry called Friday's developments "regrettable."
U.S.
State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Friday the United States is
very concerned that North Korea is moving closer to the weaponization
of nuclear materials.
The U.S. has repeatedly called for North
Korea to return to six-party talks on its nuclear program. North Korea
quit negotiations with China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the U.S.
earlier this year to protest U.N. condemnation of a long-range missile
test. North Korea says it will only hold talks with the U.S.
North Korea has recently made a series of conciliatory gestures, including the release of two detained American journalists.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.
News
