NKorea tells US to drop 'hostile policy' in nuke talks

BEIJING: Six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear programme entered a third day Saturday as a pro-Pyongyang paper said success in the negotiations depended on US willingness to abandon its 'hostile policy.'   

Discussions in Beijing were expected to focus on fuel aid to North Korea and on what the reclusive regime had to do to disable its nuclear facilities, according to participants.   

"What you're looking at are specific actions, in terms of taking things apart and trying to measure the effect of that action by the number of months it would take to (put) it back together," US chief envoy Christopher Hill said.   

"If that sounds like a lot of nuts and bolts, it is," he said prior to the start of the day's talks.   

White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Friday Bush had given the go-ahead for 25 million dollars worth of fuel aid for 50,000 metric tonnes of heavy fuel oil.   

The aid was in response to North Korea's progress on reporting and disabling its nuclear facilities as required in a February agreement aimed at halting Pyongyang's drive for nuclear weapons.   

The move came after Hill said Friday that North Korea had agreed to take further steps towards ending its nuclear weapons programmes.   

But even as the energy shipment was being announced the pro-North Korean Chosun Sinbo, published in Tokyo, suggested another bone of contention in its Internet edition Saturday.   

It said Washington must stick to its side of the February deal by removing the designation of North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism and cancelling sanctions applied under the US Trading with the Enemy Act.   

"The success or failure of the six-party talks depends on whether the US side gives the DPRK (North Korea) a trustworthy and firm guarantee concerning action plans for ending its hostile policy," the newspaper said.   

"If the US is genuinely intent on changing over its hostile policy toward the DPRK, it must take action including institutional and legal changes."   

Hill had said early Saturday he was hoping to wrap up the talks in the afternoon, a day ahead of schedule, and leave China on a plane for New York.   

He later appeared to have abandoned the travel plans, saying that he would attend a dinner hosted by the Chinese government Saturday night.   

The chief envoys from the six nations - China, the two Koreas, the United States, Japan and Russia - were scheduled to meet Saturday morning.   

North Korea had signalled ahead of this week's session that it was willing to continue pushing ahead with the landmark disarmament deal brokered in February in the six-nation forum.   

That deal saw North Korea agree to abandon the nuclear weapons programmes it has spent decades developing in return for one million tonnes of fuel oil or equivalent aid, as well as diplomatic and security concessions.   

In July, North Korea shut down its main nuclear reactor at Yongbyon and four other related facilities.   

In return it received the first deliveries of fuel oil and began diplomatic fence-building talks with rivals the United States and Japan.   

The next phase currently under discussion would see North Korea give a full declaration of all the nuclear programmes it has developed.   

South Korean chief delegate Chun Yung-woo said early Saturday he expected progress to be made during the talks.   

"There is no objection to the deadline for declaring and disabling (the nuclear facilities)," he said.   

"An agreement has been made to do it by the end of this year. North Korea also has no objection to doing it by the end of this year (but) we need more consultations about what to declare and disable by the end of this year."