NKorea eyes 2nd test if dispute not resolved

Beijing, Jan 31: North Korea will feel compelled to announce plans for another nuclear test if a financial dispute with Washington is not resolved, a source said today, a sign of Pyongyang's impatience with a lack of progress in talks.

US Deputy Assistant Treasury Secretary Daniel Glaser resumed talks with North Korean officials in Beijing yesterday over the dispute over currency counterfeiting. He said the talks were inching forward and had ''established a framework'' for more negotiations.

Glaser also said that US Secret Service officials had presented North Korean officials with their findings.

The source with close ties to the North Korean government said the United States lacked evidence of wrongdoing, however, and that North Korea would likely express its frustration when it comes to six-party talks scheduled for February 8 in Beijing.

''If the United States does not resolve it, North Korea will have no choice but to announce at the six-party talks that it plans to conduct another test,'' the source told Reuters after being briefed by a North Korean official.

The last session of talks grouping the two Koreas, the United States, Japan, Russia and host China was held in December two months after Pyongyang dramatically raised the stakes by holding its first nuclear test and yielded no breakthrough.

The December session bogged down over Pyongyang's complaints about a US financial crackdown that led to Macau freezing 24 million dollars in North Korean accounts.

The US Treasury has accused Macau's Banco Delta Asia of helping North Korea launder earnings from counterfeit US dollars and drug trafficking.

US officials have held out little hope of a quick resolution to the financial negotiations.

''It's an extremely huge insult to a sovereign country,'' the source said of the financial curbs.

''If the United States does not resolve it, North Korea would be a 'sinner' taking part in the six-party talks ... North Korea would have no face and could not be on equal footing with the other parties at the six-party talks.

''The United States has no evidence, just like it had no evidence Iraq had weapons of mass destruction,'' the source said.

The North Korean Embassy in Beijing declined to comment. The Chinese Foreign Ministry could not immediately be reached.

Reuters

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