US President George W Bush will not enter into direct talks with North Korea to end its nuclear drive, his spokesperson has said amid seemingly new enthusiasm by Pyongyang to end the standoff. "That approach didn't work previously," White House spokesperson Scott McClellan said yesterday.
He said Bush believed it was "important to work through the multilateral six-party talks to bring about a peaceful diplomatic resolution to this concern."
North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il's visit to China last week appeared to have given greater momentum to the talks between China, South Korea, Japan, the United States, North Korea and Russia to resolve the nuclear issue. Pyongyang earlier announced it would attend May 12 talks in Beijing aimed at setting up a fresh round of the six-nation negotiations by the end of June.
A North Korean foreign ministry spokesman had said Pyongyang wanted to discuss compensation for freezing its nuclear programs at the working group meeting.
| Another way of trying to extort us for food and oil. |
John Kerry, Bush's presumptive rival in the November presidential elections, charged on Wednesday that the incumbent had failed in his policy on North Korea. Kerry wants direct talks with Pyongyang on a range of issues, not only the nuclear question.
| Thus giving Kimmie everything he wants. Oh JFK, you are so unsophisticated. |
But McClellan, citing North Korea's broken promise, rejected any notion that Bush was willing to bargain on compensations for North Korea and open a direct dialogue with North Korea. |