S. Korea: North wants better US ties

North Korea wants the standoff over its nuclear weapons program resolved in order to forge better ties with the United States, South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun said Friday.

Roh made the remark while briefing foreign media on his rare talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il earlier this month, which produced a wide-ranging agreement on bringing greater peace and expanding economic cooperation on the divided peninsula.

"The reason North Korea is trying to solve the North Korean nuclear question is to improve relations with the United States," Roh told foreign media organizations, including The Associated Press.

It was unclear, however, if Roh's statement was based on Kim's direct words or the president's own view of the situation. Roh did not elaborate, and no follow-up questions were allowed in the news conference.

Some North Korea analysts had speculated that Kim might try to convey to the U.S. his seriousness about resolving the nuclear issue through Roh.

North Korea has been increasingly compliant in international talks to get rid of its nuclear program since the U.S. significantly softened its approach toward Pyongyang after the Communist regime conducted its first-ever nuclear test last October.

The North agreed in February to shut down its sole functioning nuclear reactor and disable it in exchange for economic aid and political concessions from its negotiating counterparts — the United States, China, Japan, South Korea and Russia.

Pyongyang closed the Yongbyon reactor in July and recently committed to disabling it by year's end. Earlier this week, a team of U.S. experts wrapped up a weeklong trip to the North aimed at mapping out a disablement plan.

Roh also said that he does not believe that impoverished North Korea would collapse, and that the South would therefore not be forced to absorb the Communist nation at great cost, as in the case of the formerly divided Germany.

He rejected criticism that the summit agreement, which included pledges to increase economic cooperation, would be a huge financial burden to South Korea, saying most of the projects would be funded by the private sector.

"North Korea is not a land of danger, but a land of opportunity for us," he said.

This month's summit was only the second between the two Koreas since the peninsula was divided more than a half-century ago after World War II.

The first summit, in 2000, touched off a flurry of exchanges between the two sides — who are still technically in a state of conflict, because the armistice ending the 1950-53 Korean War was never replaced by a peace treaty.

Roh and Kim agreed on seeking to formally end the war and to organize a summit of related countries to discuss the issue. Roh said the ambiguity about the format was because China, also a party to the armistice, had not explicitly expressed its interest in forging a peace treaty.

Now that Beijing has made clear such an intention after the inter-Korean summit, Roh said the peace talks would be a four-way meeting also involving the two Koreas and the U.S. After North Korea invaded the South on June 25, 1950, the U.S. led a multinational United Nations force against the Chinese-backed North Korea.

Meanwhile, the U.N. food agency said thousands of tons of food aid to North Korea is being delayed because of a railway dispute between the regime and Chinese train companies.

Some 8,000 tons of corn and wheat flour are sitting in the northeast Chinese town of Dandong, which borders North Korea, said Paul Risley, a Bangkok-based spokesman for the U.N. World Food Program.

"There is critically needed humanitarian food aid that is purchased and waiting for shipment," Risley said by telephone. "We need for that food to be released."

The snarl means hundreds of thousands of North Koreans are going hungry in areas devastated by summer floods, and it could indicate strained relations between the neighbors.

Beijing has long been Pyongyang's biggest aid source and top trading partner, but its patience has been wearing thin since the North conducted its first nuclear test a year ago — underscoring that six-nation disarmament talks hosted by China had not dimmed the regime's nuclear ambitions.

Risley said the delay, which has lasted for weeks, was triggered by a dispute between Chinese companies who send freight trains to the North but do not get them back, or have them come back later than promised.

China's Railway Ministry told the WFP about the dispute Oct. 11 and said no more trains would be sent across the border until the cars were returned, Risley added.

The ministry did not give more details on the dispute, he said.

The Financial Times reported that 1,800 train cars have not been returned because North Koreans were dismantling them and selling them for scrap metal.

A railway ministry official who gave only his surname, Huang, said he was "not aware of the problem."

"Rail transportation between China and North Korea is normal and has no problem at all," Huang said.

North Korea has relied on foreign assistance to feed its 23 million people for more than a decade after natural disasters and mismanagement devastated its economy in the 1990s. It has been short of about 1 million tons of food annually in recent years.

Risley said the bulk of the food aid that is being delayed will go to more than 215,000 flood victims after the worst rains in 40 years destroyed more than 11 percent of North Korea's crops in August. More than 220 people were killed and 89,000 people were left homeless.

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Associated Press Writer Audra Ang in Beijing contributed to this report.