S. Korea sees momentum for nuke talks after U.S. envoy's Pyongyang trip

(ATTN: SUBS paras 8, 10, 11 with N.K. acceptance of flu aid)
By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, Dec. 20 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's unification minister, in charge of
relations with North Korea, said Thursday that international efforts to end the
communist country's nuclear program will pick up following a U.S. envoy's visit
to Pyongyang.
Stephen Bosworth, U.S. special representative for North Korea policy, was in
Seoul after what he described as a "very useful" trip to Pyongyang aimed at
restarting a multilateral denuclearization forum.
"After Bosworth's visit to North Korea, although it's difficult to say yet what
will happen, I expect the steps we have been taking to resolve the North Korean
nuclear issue under close cooperation with related nations will pick up speed,"
Hyun In-taek said in a forum here marking the 18th anniversary of an inter-Korean
non-aggression treaty.
North Korea withdrew from the six-party nuclear talks in April in protest over
punitive U.N. sanctions imposed on the country after its long-range rocket
launch. The North then conducted a nuclear test, prompting harsher U.N.
sanctions. The six-party forum involves the two Koreas, the United States, China,
Japan and Russia.
But the North turned to conciliatory diplomacy in the following months, with its
leader Kim Jong-il pledging to return to the six-party talks if Pyongyang first
makes progress in bilateral talks with Washington. Bosworth held the first of
such talks with Pyongyang this week since the Barack Obama administration came to
power in January.
Hyun said the flurry of diplomacy has brought a "turning point" to the peninsula.
"The situation on the Korean Peninsula has become increasingly flexible. The
peninsula and inter-Korean relations are now at an important turning point," he
said.
The North Korea policy maker welcomed a recent spate of inter-Korean accords that
may ease tensions that began to flare after conservative President Lee Myung-bak
took office in Seoul last year. Pyongyang accepted Lee's "unconditional" offer of
medical aid on Thursday, a day after it acknowledged an outbreak of the H1N1
virus in the country. The Koreas will also send a joint team to factory parks in
China and Vietnam later this week to find an international model for their shared
industrial complex.
"North Korea has withdrawn hardline measures and said it would try to resolve
pressing issues through inter-Korean dialogue. These are quite meaningful," Hyun
said.
Officials said Seoul will send a "sufficient" amount of Tamiflu and other
medicine to help stem the flu outbreak among the North's population of 24
million.
The North has so far reported nine cases of the new flu, though the World Health
Organization has warned "there may be more cases" than those already confirmed.
hkim@yna.co.kr
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