Powell Sees Progress On North Korea

Secretary of State Colin Powell says a flurry of third party diplomatic contacts with North Korea have yielded some progress in an effort to induce Pyongyang to curb its nuclear weapons programs.

Powell commented Tuesday in an interview with a group of U.S. reporters. A text of his remarks was made public on Wednesday by the State Department.

Senior officials from Australia, Russia and the United Nations have traveled to North Korea in recent days. In addition, North Korean officials opened talks in South Korea on Wednesday.

Powell said these contacts are being used to explore ways to move forward. "I'm comfortable that we are making some progress, but I don't think I'm predicting a breakthrough," he said.

He called negotiating with the North Koreans "a very difficult, arduous process."

While Powell was cautious about the meaning of these contacts, his use of the word "progress" suggested movement.

It may have been the first time the word has been used in the North Korean context since the disclosure in October that Pyongyang had embarked on a uranium-based nuclear weapons program.

Powell said he felt reassured by the support that leading countries have shown for the U.S. position on North Korea.

"They have all spoken out against what North Korea has done and they have all spoken in support of the diplomatic approach that we are taking and they are all hopeful that conditions can be created where we will be able to talk directly to the North Koreans and find a solution," he said.

In Pyongyang, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov presented a Russian proposal that calls for nuclear-free status for the Korean peninsula, security guarantees for North Korea and a package of humanitarian and economic aid.

Losyukov said afterward that the trip left him with some optimism that the North Korea problem can be resolved.

"The North Korean side is prepared for a dialogue with Washington ... on the question of normalizing (the situation) on the Korean peninsula," he was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.

There has been a steady softening in the administration's position in hopes that North Korea will reconsider its nuclear program.

A few weeks ago, the administration had said it would not offer inducements for the North Koreans to live up to the nuclear agreements and treaties it has violated.

But last week, President Bush said the United States would revive an offer to provide assistance in energy and agriculture if North Korea were to reverse course.

He also has said that the United States has no plans to attack North Korea.

The administration has given no sign that it will seek U.N. Security Council sanctions against North Korea following its recent decision to shut down an International Atomic Energy Agency monitoring effort at a nuclear site north of Pyongyang.

North Korea has said it would consider U.N. sanctions to be an act of war. The IAEA is expected to report the issue to the Security Council in the coming days.

Meanwhile, a North Korean energy official said a nuclear reactor at the center of the dispute will start generating electricity "within weeks," a pro-North Korean newspaper based in Japan reported Wednesday.

"We are currently hurrying the process," Vice Minister Shin Yong Sung of the North's Power and Coal Industries told Choson Shinbo, a daily published by the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan.

Experts say the North's main nuclear complex at Yongbyon could produce several nuclear weapons within months. North Korea says it is reviving the 5-megawatt reactor, which had been frozen since 1994 under a deal with the United States, to generate badly needed electricity and has no intention to produce weapons.