TOKYO: Japan’s chief delegate to six-nation talks on North Korea’s nuclear disarmament will visit Beijing at the weekend for talks with his Chinese counterpart, the foreign ministry in Tokyo said on Friday.
Akitaka Saiki, who heads the ministry’s Asian and Oceanian affairs bureau, will meet on Saturday with Wu Dawei, China’s special representative for Korean Peninsula affairs, amid pressure on Beijing to rein in its close ally.
Inter-Korean tensions have escalated after North Korea’s deadly shelling of a South Korean border island on November 23 and the revelation last month of Pyongyang’s uranium enrichment programme.
Saiki, who held talks with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Borodavkin in Moscow Thursday on the Korean situation, is expected to push China to help ease tensions, Japanese media said.
Washington has also been pushing China over North Korea.
Wu was at a meeting on Thursday in Pyongyang between North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il and Chinese State Councillor Dai Bingguo, and Saiki is eager to hear about the outcome of the talks, Kyodo news agency said.
Saiki and Wu are also expected to discuss conditions for holding an emergency meeting of chief delegates of the six powers that was proposed by China to ease tensions, Kyodo said.
The six-way dialogue, which is deadlocked, involves the two Koreas, China, the United States, Japan
and Russia.
Japan, the United States and South Korea have so far reacted negatively to China’s proposal, saying Pyongyang should first demonstrate its intention to cease provocative actions.
