North Korea reconsidering place at nuclear talks
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-12-13 15:57

North Korea is seriously reconsidering its role in talks on its nuclear plans because of what it sees as a concerted campaign to topple the North's ruling system, the North Korean Foreign Ministry said on Monday.

The United States had launched a psychological campaign to persuade people there was a crisis in the North, including mass defections by generals to China, the ministry said in a lengthy English-language statement.

"Under this situation the DPRK is compelled to seriously reconsider its participation in the talks with the U.S., a party extremely disgusting and hateful," said the statement, published by the official KCNA news agency. DPRK stands for the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

Although the North used trademark ambiguity in its wording, the ministry spokesman's comments appeared to be referring to six-country nuclear talks that involve the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States.

The five regional powers are seeking to persuade the North to ditch its nuclear weapons ambitions in return for aid and security guarantees.

The latest remarks represented a hardening of Pyongyang's position since it said in a ministry statement on Dec. 4 that the North would not return to the six-party talks until re-elected President Bush had assembled his new team and Washington had decided its policy.

"Now that the U.S. is trying to shake the backbone of the DPRK, not content with hurling mud at it, the DPRK is compelled to say something to the U.S.," Monday's statement said.

"The present situation makes us deplore the fact that the U.S. administration has only those politicians who are utterly ignorant of the DPRK to handle its Korean policy," it said.

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