Japan, SKorean leaders regret NKorean talks failure

FUKUOKA, (AFP)

The leaders of Japan and South Korea on Saturday voiced regret over the failure of talks on North Korea’s nuclear drive and pledged to keep working to disarm their neighbour.

Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso and South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak in a meeting “shared the view that it was regrettable that North Korea refused to discuss verification” of its nuclear disarmament, a Japanese official said.

“But they agreed to continue to cooperate closely in the six-nation talks as the verification issue is very important in pressing ahead with North Korean denuclearisation,” said the official, who witnessed the 50-minute meeting.

Aso and Lee met in the southwestern Japan prefecture of Fukuoka ahead of a rare joint summit with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao aimed at shielding Asia from the global economic crisis and breaking the impasse over North Korea.

South Korea, Japan and China are members of the six-nation forum which is trying to persuade North Korea to scrap its nuclear programme in return for aid and diplomatic benefits.

Delegates to the forum failed in Beijing Thursday to reach a deal on ways to inspect the North’s declared nuclear facilities, and set no date for their next meeting.

The United States said there will be no more fuel aid shipments to energy-strapped North Korea until it agrees to a written plan to verify its nuclear disarmament. Japan has championed a hard line on North Korea and refused to offer aid due to a dispute over Pyongyang’s past kidnappings of Japanese civilians to train its spies. China and South Korea, however, are major partners of the North.

Lee and Aso also welcomed an accord Friday between South Korea and Japan to boost their currency swap deal in defence of the won, which has come under massive selling pressure in the global crisis.

The one-day summit could give an opportunity to score diplomatic points for Aso and Lee, who are both wallowing from sagging popularity.

Lee visited Japan in April, becoming the first South Korean leader to visit the neighbouring country in more than three years amid lingering bitterness over Japan’s 1910-1945 rule over the Korean peninsula.