Russia welcomes N. Korea’s readiness for dialogue

MOSCOW/BEIJING: Russia welcomes North Korea’s declaration of readiness to return to talks with world powers, a senior Russian diplomat was cited by the Interfax news agency as saying yesterday.
“The fact that Pyongyang has declared its readiness and desire to return to the negotiating table... deserves a positive assessment,” Interfax quoted Russian Foreign Ministry special envoy Grigory Logvinov as saying.
A North Korean envoy told China’s president yesterday that his reclusive country was willing to take “positive actions,” including returning to six-party nuclear talks with world powers.
A top North Korean envoy delivered a letter from leader Kim Jong Un to Chinese President Xi Jinping yesterday and told him Pyongyang would take steps to rejoin stalled six-nation nuclear disarmament talks, in an apparent victory for Beijing’s efforts to coax its unruly ally into lowering tensions.
North Korean Vice Marshal Choe Ryong Hae’s visit was part of efforts to mend fences after Pyongyang angered Beijing with recent snubs and moves to develop its nuclear program.
The official China News Service said Choe delivered the handwritten letter from Kim to Xi at an afternoon meeting at the Great Hall of the People in central Beijing. It gave no details about the letter’s contents.
North Korea is willing to work with all sides to “appropriately resolve the relevant questions through the six-party talks and other forms,” Choe was quoted as saying by Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
China has been under intense pressure from Washington to push North Korea into lowering tensions and resuming dialogue.
Xi reaffirmed longstanding ties between the communist neighbors, and urged all sides to “keep cool and exercise restraint.”
The six-party talks should aim to end North Korea’s nuclear programs and “maintain lasting peace and stability on the peninsula and in northeast Asia,” Xi was quoted as saying.
China is believed to have agreed to Choe’s visit only after Pyongyang committed to returning to the process of negotiation, and required him to state that publicly twice before his meeting with Xi.
Earlier yesterday, a top Chinese general told Choe that Beijing wanted a peaceful, denuclearized Korean Peninsula, in a reiteration of China’s established position that could also be seen as a rebuke to the North.