Ban said no date for a new meeting had been fixed, but most of the six countries concerned had agreed on the need for resuming the talks "at the earliest possible date and, most desirably, in February."

"I don't think the prospect for holding a second round of the six-nation talks in February is gloomy," said Ban, appointed 10 days ago after his predecessor stepped down. "But no date has not yet been fixed."

The hermit state North Korea offered recently to freeze its nuclear weapons drive in return for concessions, including an end to US sanctions and a resumption of energy aid.

Ban said South Korea, the United States and Japan saw some "positive elements" in the offer, but that it fell short of meeting international calls for a resolution to the crisis.

"The three countries have a position that there must be a complete, irreversible and verifiable pledge by North Korea to dismantle its nuclear programmes," Ban said.

"The issue of highly enriched uranium must also be dealt with in resolving the nuclear issue."

James Kelly, the top US diplomat for Asia and the Pacific, said last week he believed it was still possible to hold a second round of talks that would eventually result in persuading North Korea to dismantle its nuclear programs.

Such an agreement, however, would have to be comprehensive and include verifiable pledges by Pyongyang to eliminate its uranium enrichment program, plutonium reprocessing and existing atomic weapons, he said.

Kelly will arrive in Seoul February 1 for two days of discussions on the second round of six-way nuclear negotiations, Yonhap news agency reported South Korea's foreign ministry as saying Wednesday.

Kelly will meet with Ban and other senior officials before visiting Tokyo for similar consultations with his Japanese counterparts, Yonhap said.

North Korea showed an unofficial US delegation to the country earlier this month what it said was plutonium but denied having a uranium program, rejecting US accounts of a 2002 meeting in which Pyongyang was said to have admitted to such a program.

That reported admission triggered the current crisis which led to North Korea kicking out UN arms inspectors, unfreezing its plutonium program and pulling out of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The first round of the six-party talks was held in Beijing in August, involving the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia, but failed to produce any tangible progress.

WAR.WIRE