Japan to put abductees on NKorea talks agenda

Hanoi, Mar 6: Japanese and North Korean diplomats met today to smooth the way towards improving relations, but Tokyo said it would not establish ties until the issue of its citizens abducted by Pyongyang was resolved.

The talks in Vietnam follow a complex deal reached by six countries last month under which communist North Korea promised to scrap its nuclear weapons programme in exchange for aid.

Japan says it will not give full-scale economic assistance to North Korea or establish diplomatic ties unless the feud over Japanese citizens it kidnapped in the 1970s and 1980s to train spies in Japanese language and culture is resolved.

In Tokyo today, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe stressed that the abduction issue was one that Japan cannot give up.

''In this six-way talks, of course solving the nuclear issue is a large theme,'' he told a parliamentary committee.

''But for Japan the abduction issue is also one that absolutely cannot be abandoned. To solve this, to solve the issues between Japan and North Korea, unless they change their stance we can't fundamentally change ours.'' Japan wants more information about the abductees but North Korea says the matter is closed.

Today's ''informal'' encounters at the Japanese embassy in Hanoi were designed to set agendas for tomorrow and Thursday -- their first full-fledged discussions in more than a year on forging diplomatic ties.

''We will have talks today with the main purpose of discussing arrangements for meetings set for tomorrow and the day after tomorrow,'' Japan's chief negotiator Koichi Haraguchi said.

Officials from both countries held similar talks in Beijing a year ago but failed to make visible progress.

Aid Reluctant

A failure to improve ties could spoil the six-party agreement because Tokyo is reluctant to give large-scale aid to Pyongyang in return for abandoning its nuclear ambitions.

Under the February 13 six-party deal, North Korea would receive energy aid in exchange for ''disabling'' its nuclear facilities.

But Japan has refused to pitch in.

Japanese officials said Tokyo would use the Hanoi talks to press Pyongyang to resolve the kidnappings issue.

''It is important for us spend ample time to discuss the abduction issue, and on the contrary I believe they want to set aside sufficient time for talks on settling the past as they have expressed strong interest in that,'' Haraguchi said.

''It is important to ensure the balance between the two.'' North Korea admitted in 2002 that its agents had abducted 13 Japanese, sparking outrage in Japan. Five of those were repatriated the same year, but Pyongyang says eight others are dead.

For its part, North Korea is expected to press for settlement of issues stemming from Japan's harsh 1910-45 colonial rule of the Korean peninsula.

In a September 2002 meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, then-Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi apologised for Japan's actions but he rejected demands for reparations.

The Hanoi meetings and separate talks in New York yesterday between the United States and North Korea are the beginning of the implementation of the February 13 deal reached in Beijing by the two Koreas, the United States, Japan, Russia and China.

Reuters