Seoul envoy to visit China for N. Korea nuclear talks

SEOUL: South Korea's chief nuclear envoy Wi Sung-Lac will visit Beijing this week for talks with his Chinese counterpart on North Korea's atomic programmes, the foreign ministry said Tuesday.

Wi will meet Wu Dawei on Thursday, the first day of his two-day visit.

"The two will exchange ideas on a wide range of issues including the current situation of the North's nuclear programmes and future responses," the ministry said in a statement, without elaborating.

China's push to restart stalled six-nation nuclear disarmament talks, and the North's recent disclosure of a uranium enrichment programme, are expected to be high on the agenda.

Pyongyang last November showed off the new programme to visiting US experts. It says the plant will be part of a peaceful nuclear power project, but experts say it could easily be reconfigured to produce material for atomic weapons.

South Korea is trying to refer the uranium issue to the United Nations Security Council, which ordered the North to shut down all atomic activities following two tests of plutonium bombs.

China, the North's ally and a veto-wielding Council member, has not said whether it would support a referral.

But President Hu Jintao, at a summit last month with US leader Barack Obama, expressed concern at the claimed uranium programme.

The six-nation talks grouping China, the United States, the two Koreas, Russia and Japan, have been in stasis since December 2008.

China wants them revived as part of a process to ease overall tensions on the Korean peninsula. The United States says the North must mend ties with the South before the nuclear dialogue can resume.

The two Koreas held military talks Tuesday, their first encounter since the North's deadly shelling of a South Korean island last November.

Center>Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011