"If the information in question proves accurate, I would say that North Korea has made the wrong choice," Ivanov told a high-level meeting of international security experts in the German city of Munich.

"I believe we should do all we can to keep that state in the treaty framework," Ivanov added.

North Korea announced this week it was withdrawing from six-country talks over its nuclear weapons and vowed to build more atomic bombs.

Russia, along with the United States, China, South Korea and Japan have held three rounds of talks with North Korea since August 2003 with a view to lowering tensions and persuading the Stalinist state to give up its nuclear weapons program.

However, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Friday that informal negotiations were continuing despite Pyongyang's announcement.

"The consultations over North Korea never stopped, and are continuing on a normal basis," Lavrov said.

"International contacts between all of the participants of the negotiations are continuing," he said.

Lavrov did not explain where, or between whom, the talks were taking place.

The United States on Friday rejected North Korea's call for direct negotiations outside the context of the six-party talks.

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