Pyeongyang signals hope for better ties with the U.S.

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Pyeongyang signals hope for better ties with the U.S.

A U.S. delegation led by Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly arrived in Pyeongyang Thursday for talks with North Korean officials. Pyeongyang seemed to moderate its propaganda for the occasion.

The bilateral talks are the first senior-level contact since negotiations in Kuala Lumpur on North Korea's missile program. That was in November 2000, during the Clinton administration.

U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher had told reporters in Washington that there would be little information available on the talks, and neither the Americans nor the North Koreans have said whom Mr. Kelly, a presidential emissary, will meet while in Pyeongyang. Observers in Seoul predicted it would be Kang Sok-ju, North Korean vice minister of foreign affairs.

A government official in Seoul said Pyeongyang would probably demand that Washington abandon what the North considers, reasonably enough, to be a hostile policy toward the North.

"It is my understanding that Mr. Kelly does not carry a letter from the U.S. president to Kim Jong-il," the official added.

On Thursday, North Korea kept up its criticism of Washington's policies, but eased the tone of the criticism a bit. Radio Pyeongyang said Thursday that the frozen relations between North Korea and the United States were a result of U.S. hostility. "But we are willing to improve bilateral relations with hostile countries if they respect our sovereignty and abandon their harsh stances," the state-run media said.

Despite Mr. Kelly's earlier warning against too much optimism about his trip, North Korea's high hopes were suggested by comments from Han Song-ryol, North Korea's deputy representative to the United Nations. "The Kelly visit will be an opportunity to change the contention between the two countries," Mr. Han said, according to the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun. North Korea and the United States "should put an end to the armistice of the Korean War and sign a peace treaty," he added.

by Oh Young-hwan, Oh Day-young

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