Bosworth coming home from Asian tour without visiting Pyongyang: State Dept.

WASHINGTON, May 11 (Yonhap) -- The U.S. special representative for North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, is coming back home from his weeklong Asian tour Tuesday without visiting either Moscow or Pyongyang, the State Department said Monday.

Asked if Bosworth proposed to visit the North Korean capital during his trip,
spokesman Ian Kelly said, "No, he has no plan to visit North Korea. It's too
early to go to North Korea." He did not elaborate.
Bosworth is now in Tokyo on the third leg of his three-nation tour that also took
him to Beijing and Seoul, where he reiterated Washington's commitment to engage
North Korea both bilaterally and through the six-party talks for the
denuclearization of the reclusive communist state.
North Korea rejected Bosworth's proposal to visit Pyongyang in early March amid
allegations Pyongyang was upping the ante before engaging Washington bilaterally
for a breakthrough in the six-party talks, which have been faltering for the past
six years.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently described the chances of North
Korea returning to the six-party talks as "implausible if not impossible." North
Korea has repeatedly threatened to boycott the talks, which include the two
Koreas, the U.S., China, Russia and Japan.
In anger over the U.N. Security Council's imposition of sanctions over three
North Korean firms for Pyongyang's launch of a rocket on April 5, the North has
also vowed to restart its nuclear facilities and conduct further nuclear and
ballistic missile tests unless the Security Council apologizes for its
condemnation of the launch.
Kelly said that Sung Kim, special envoy to the six-party talks, will lead the
U.S. delegation to Moscow.
"Ambassador Bosworth is returning back here on May 12th, and the rest of the
delegation will go on to Moscow and then return to Washington on May 14th," he
said, adding Bosworth "had another engagement that precluded him going on to
Moscow."
On the fate of two American journalists detained in North Korea, Kelly said North
Korean authorities would not allow the Swedish ambassador in Pyongyang to visit
them a second time since the first visit on March 30.
"I'm not aware of any kind of reasons that I've been given to it, as to why
they're denying the consular access, which of course is contrary to the Vienna
Convention," he said. "We're very concerned about the safety and welfare of these
two."
The Swedish embassy handles consular affairs involving American citizens in North
Korea as Washington does not have diplomat relations with the North.
North Korea said in late April that it had concluded an investigation and will
formally refer the journalists to trial for illegal entry and "hostile acts."
Euna Lee and Laura Ling, from Current TV, a San Francisco-based Internet outlet,
face up to 20 years in prison if convicted of espionage under the North Korean
criminal code. By contrast, a charge of illegal entry would carry only a few
years' imprisonment.
The journalists were reportedly taken by North Korean soldiers March 17 along the
Tumen River on the Chinese border while filming the North Korean side.
hdh@yna.co.kr