US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill was among those who arrived Sunday in the Chinese capital for six-nation talks expected to kick off Monday. Earlier in the day there had been doubts the meeting would proceed at all.

"The six-party talks will open at 3:00 pm (0700 GMT) on December 8, before which host China will have bilateral meetings with each of the other parties," South Korean envoy Kim Sook told reporters.

Earlier, asked about the prospect for progress in the talks, Kim was quoted by Yonhap news agency as saying: "I am not optimistic at all."

That came after North Korea said Saturday it would not recognise the participation of Japan in the six-nation forum in protest over Tokyo's refusal to provide promised energy aid.

"We will neither treat Japan as a party to the talks nor deal with it even if it impudently appears in the conference room, lost to shame," the communist country's foreign ministry said in a statement.

Hill, who confirmed the talks would begin Monday, played down the importance of North Korea's position on Japan.

"I don't think it is important for North Korea to be including or excluding anybody of the six-party talks," he told reporters Sunday. "Frankly speaking, it's definitely not changing anything for us."

Hill has predicted difficult discussions after preparatory meetings with his North Korean counterpart Kim Kye-Gwan in Singapore last week.

After reaching Beijing, Hill went quickly into preliminary meetings with the South Korean and Japanese envoys, South Korean officials told AFP.

A US embassy spokeswoman confirmed Hill met Sunday some of his counterparts but stressed they would not include the North Koreans.

The latest round of six-party talks is scheduled to discuss ways of verifying North Korea's declaration of its nuclear facilities.

Under a 2007 pact involving the two Koreas, Japan, the United States, Russia and hosts China, Pyongyang agreed to disable facilities at its plutonium-producing Yongbyon nuclear complex and reveal its atomic activities.

In return, it was to get one million tonnes of fuel oil or energy aid of equivalent value. About half has been delivered.

Japan has withheld its share until North Korea accounts fully for Japanese nationals kidnapped by Pyongyang during the Cold War.

The North has admitted it seized Japanese to train its spies and in 2002 let five return. It says the others are dead but Japan believes they are alive.

In October, after reaching an apparent agreement on verification procedures, the US said it would drop North Korea from a terrorism blacklist, and the North reversed plans to restart its plutonium-producing nuclear plants.

However, North Korea, which tested an atomic weapon in October 2006, is now reportedly opposing the idea of atomic samples being taken away by inspectors.

The US State Department in Washington and the US embassy in Beijing have said they had received no official confirmation from Beijing that the talks would go ahead on Monday.

However, members of the South Korean delegation told AFP the talks would definitely be held beginning on Monday afternoon.

Six-nation negotiations for North Korea's nuclear disarmament are still on track for Beijing next week even though China has yet to announce the event, the US State Department said Friday.

A US official said meanwhile on condition of anonymity that US-North Korean talks in Singapore offered no guarantee the meeting in Beijing would succeed but also gave no sign the process would "fall apart" either.

State Department deputy spokesman Robert Wood told reporters "it's scheduled to happen" when asked if the talks involving the two Koreas, United States, China, Japan and Russia might not take place as scheduled on Monday.

"I have heard nothing about any possibility of it not taking place," Wood said. "The negotiations will take place in Beijing."

US envoy Christopher Hill and North Korean counterpart Kim Kye-Gwan ended two days of talks Friday in Singapore aimed at clarifying steps they agreed in October to ensure that North Korea is telling the truth about its disarmament.

The pair indicated Friday there were still difficulties over the issue of removing samples from nuclear sites.

Washington expects the pair, plus their counterparts from the four other countries in the negotiations, to meet Monday in Beijing to seal a written agreement enshrining the verification measures.

A US State Department official who asked not to be named said it was not clear why China, host of the six-party negotiations, had not yet announced the meeting in Beijing.

"Why? I don't know," the official said.

The official said that Hill was still confident of obtaining the written verification protocol despite the difficulties in the negotiations.

"It's going to be hard for Chris himself to be able to give you a good sense right now of whether we're going to be able to accomplish all of our objectives by the end of Beijing," the official said.

"But certainly Chris is very hopeful that we can do this," the official added.

"It's hard to be confident with the North Koreans any time you are having negotiations but I think we're certainly hopeful and I haven't received hints so far that ... this is likely to fall apart," the official said.

In October, after reaching an apparent agreement on verification procedures, the US announced it would drop the communist North from a terrorism blacklist, and the North reversed plans to restart its plutonium-producing nuclear plants.

However, North Korea, which tested an atomic weapon in October 2006, insists it never agreed to samples of atomic material being taken away. Washington says it did.

earlier related report
related report
NKorea says it won't recognise Japan at nuclear talks
Seoul (AFP) Dec 6 - North Korea said Saturday it would not recognise Japan as a member of upcoming six-nation nuclear disarmament talks because it refuses to provide its share of energy aid promised to Pyongyang.

It was unclear what effect the latest announcement would have on the next round of talks, which are set to resume in Beijing on Monday.

"We will neither treat Japan as a party to the talks nor deal with it even if it impudently appears in the conference room, lost to shame," the communist state's foreign ministry said in a statement.

The nuclear-armed North has frequently called for Japan to be excluded from the forum, which began meeting in August 2003 and has frequently come close to breakdown.

But US chief negotiator Christopher Hill, who arrived late Saturday in South Korea and urged the North to improve ties with Japan, had predicted difficult discussions even before the latest statement from Pyongyang.

Hill held two days of preparatory talks in Singapore this week with his North Korean counterpart Kim Kye-Gwan, focusing on ways in which outside inspectors can verify the North's declaration of its nuclear activities.

He told reporters the issue would be the priority in Beijing.

Hill said he also urged the North during the Singapore talks "to reach out and have better relations with its neighbours" including Japan, and to address Tokyo's concerns.

"I think it would behoove them to issue fewer statements and do a little more work in terms of developing plans and ways for their country to progress," he said.

Under a 2007 pact involving the two Koreas, Japan, China, the United States and Russia, the North agreed to disable facilities at its plutonium-producing Yongbyon nuclear complex and deliver a declaration of its nuclear activities.

In return it was to get one million tons of fuel oil or energy aid of equivalent value. About half has so far been delivered.

But Japan says it will not provide its 200,000 tons until the North accounts fully for Japanese nationals kidnapped by Pyongyang during the Cold War era.

The North has admitted it seized Japanese to train its spies and in 2002 let five of them return. It says the others are dead but Japan believes they are still alive.

The North's statement complained that Japan "persistently and impertinently insists on its participation in the talks though it is refusing to fulfil its commitment."

Tokyo wants to block denuclearisation to give it a pretext to boost its military power, said the statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

"Such country has neither justification nor qualification to participate in the talks," it said, noting that other countries are wiling to provide Japan's share of the aid.

Australia, New Zealand and European Union member states have been approached to contribute, according to South Korea's foreign ministry.

The US in October removed the North from a terrorism blacklist after announcing they had reached agreement on ways to check the nuclear declaration delivered last June.

But the North now says it never agreed to let inspectors take samples of nuclear material out of the country for examination.

The US says it did consent to the procedure, seen as crucial to assessing how much bomb-making plutonium has been produced. The country tested a nuclear weapon in October 2006.

The US and its negotiating partners will press for a written agreement on verification procedures. "We need a situation where when we begin the verification there are no surprises," Hill said.

The forum will also discuss a schedule for delivering the remaining energy aid and for completion of the disablement work.

"I am sure the negotiations will be as usual: they will be difficult," Hill said Friday.

He was to meet his South Korean counterpart Kim Sook before leaving Sunday for Beijing.

Hill said he would have a meeting Sunday in the Chinese capital with South Korean and Japanese negotiators, and would also consult with the Russians and Chinese.

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