Speaking to local journalists on a visit to North Chungcheong province in central South Korea, Roh lamented that Seoul had been sidelined in efforts to end the 14-month stand-off, Yonhap said.

The president, promising to take a leading role in ending the crisis when elected one year ago, said the initiative was now held by Washington and Pyongyang, even though "it is a life-or-death matter to us."

"I will not just sit idle," Roh was quoted as saying. "We are trying to stop the United States from resolving the issue with fists and unilaterally."

He acknowledged, however, that North Korea, happy to engage in economic exchanges with South Korea, refused to respond to calls for political dialogue and declined to discuss the nuclear issue with Seoul.

"We lack the leverage to make the North participate in political dialogue because North Korea thinks we are in no position to provide them with a security guarantee," Yonhap quoted the president as saying.

North Korea has been seeking a non-aggression pact with the United States and other benefits in return for scrapping its nuclear arsenal. Washington has refused to enter into bilateral negotiations.

Under pressure from the United States, which insisted that South Korea and other regional nations should take part in multilateral dialogue to resolve the crisis, Pyongyang agreed to six-way talks including South Korea.

A first round of inconclusive talks brought together the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States in Beijing in August.

Months of diplomacy attempting to set up talks in December collapsed after Washington and Pyongyang failed to narrow differences concerning the scope of the negotiations. Efforts are now focusing on possible talks in January

Washington, which insists that Pyongyang must verifiably scrap its nuclear weapons, said North Korea had set preconditions, while North Korea accused the United States of ignoring its proposals.

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