Three weeks after its nuclear test, North Korea said on Wednesday it was returning to six-party talks because Washington had agreed to discuss financial sanctions Pyongyang says drove it from the negotiating table to start with.
But analysts cautioned against expecting any quick resolution in the long-stalled negotiations aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear programme.
"The DPRK (North Korea) decided to return to the six-party talks on the premise that the issue of lifting financial sanctions will be discussed and settled between the DPRK and the US within the framework of the six-party talks," said a Foreign Ministry spokesman cited by the official KCNA news agency.
DPRK stands for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, North Korea's official name.
The last round of talks between the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States broke off in November 2005 after Washington squeezed Pyongyang's access to the world financial system to punish it for illicit activities such as printing fake banknotes.
The KCNA report confirmed an announcement in Beijing the previous day of a talks resumption deal reached after seven hours of negotiations between North Korean, US and Chinese officials.
Japan and the United States, advocates of tough punitive measures against the North after its Oct. 9 nuclear test, both said that sanctions over the test should remain.
"With regard to the UN sanctions, those are international obligations," Washington's top North Korea envoy, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, told reporters before leaving Beijing on Wednesday. "The US is obligated, the DPRK is also obligated, everyone's obligated."
ENFORCE SANCTIONS
Though welcoming North Korea's decision, US President George W. Bush said he would send teams to Asia to ensure UN sanctions were enforced on the budding nuclear power.
China told foreign diplomats in Beijing on Wednesday that it would continue enforcing the UN sanctions on North Korea, and that it wanted the six-party talks to resume by the end of November, Japan's Kyodo news agency reported.
Chinese central bank regulator Liu Lianke said China was co-operating with other countries to stem illicit bank flows with North Korea.
"China will require all Chinese financial institutions to abide by international practices, especially those prescribed by the United Nations Security Council on anti-money-laundering," said Liu, who heads anti-money-laundering operations at the People's Bank of China.
Analysts said North Korea had agreed to return to the talks in part over fears of the impact of international sanctions, especially those threatened by China, the closest it has to an ally and a key prop of its impoverished economy.
But the analysts said fresh talks did not mean a change of heart in Pyongyang.
LOW EXPECTATIONS
"It really costs them nothing to come back to the table ... I think we have to have very low expectations given the fundamental distrust that exists," said Peter Beck, a Korean affairs expert with the International Crisis Group in Seoul.
Two months before the last round of talks broke off in November 2005, North Korea had agreed in principle to scrap its nuclear programme in return for aid, formal ties with Washington and Tokyo and pledges not to attack it.
After Tuesday's meeting in Beijing, Hill told a news conference he wanted "rapid progress" at the next talks, possibly in November or December.
He returned to the theme on Wednesday. "This next session has to be very carefully planned because we must achieve progress in this session," Hill told reporters in Beijing.
"It's obviously going to be very difficult."
Chaperoned by China, Tuesday's was the highest-level direct contact between US and North Korean officials for about a year. Washington had previously insisted it would only deal directly with Pyongyang within the six-party framework.
Hill said North Korea had made no promise to refrain from further tests during what he called "very business-like" talks.
South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun almost completely revamped his ministerial security team on Wednesday but analysts expected them to continue his policy of engaging the reclusive North Korean government.
South Korea's point man for the North said Seoul would now consider resuming regular food aid to the North, suspended in a unilateral gesture after the test blast