North Korean and US negotiators met on Monday for direct talks aimed at reviving long-stalled nuclear disarmament negotiations.

The US team led by outgoing special representative Stephen Bosworth, as well as his replacement Glyn Davies arrived shortly before 8.30am (0630 GMT) at the US embassy where the meeting was to begin at 10:00am.

North Korea's delegation led by first vice foreign minister Kim Kye-Gwan arrived just minutes before talks were due to start.

The delegations broke for lunch at 12.15pm and are due to reconvene at the US mission just over two hours later.

While analysts expect no breakthrough during the two-day meeting, they see engagement between the two parties as a positive development and a way to stop Pyongyang from making rash moves.

"The view is that while they are talking, they are not provoking -- it's jaw-jaw rather than war-war," Mark Fitzpatrick, who heads the non-proliferation programme at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told AFP.

"I don't think that people will say this is a disaster because there is nothing concrete in terms of results," he added.

Ahead of the meeting, a senior State Department official said "our concern is that if we don't engage, that could result in miscalculations by the North Koreans, as we have seen in the past."

"Sometimes when engagement has been broken off, it causes them to lash out in dangerous and unsettling ways," said the official.

However, the US stressed it would not return to long-stalled six-party talks unless the North made a "clear commitment ... on the denuclearization side."

Analysts believe that the North, which has insisted on the resumption of the multi-nation talks without pre-conditions, would not make a concession at the Geneva meeting.

Nevertheless, on the eve of the meeting, China's vice premier Li Keqiang visited Pyongyang, saying that his trip would help promote resumption of the negotiations, according to a statement released by the official Xinhua news agency after his arrival.

China has hosted the forum, which includes the two Koreas, Russia, the United States and Japan, since 2003.

In September 2005, the North agreed to abandon all nuclear weapons and programmes in return for security guarantees, energy aid and a peace pact formally ending the 1950-53 war and diplomatic ties with the United States.

In 2007 it shut its plutonium-producing Yongbyon reactor. But during the following year the process began to melt down amid mutual accusations of bad faith.

In April 2009 Pyongyang walked out of the six-party forum, a month before staging its second atomic weapons test.

The North's deadly artillery attack last November on a South Korean island further complicated efforts to restart nuclear dialogue.

But a surprise meeting between nuclear envoys of South and North Korea on the sidelines of an Asian security conference in Bali, Indonesia led to the first round of direct US-North Korea talks in New York in July.

The second set of discussions are coming just as the two parties agreed to resume searches for the remains of Americans killed in the 1950-53 Korean War after a six-year hiatus, in a further sign of easing tensions between the two sides.

Key developments in N. Korea nuclear standoff
Seoul (AFP) Oct 24, 2011 - The United States and North Korea are Monday scheduled to start two days of talks in Geneva aimed at reviving six-party negotiations on the North's nuclear disarmament.

Here are key dates since the latest nuclear standoff erupted:

2002

- October: The US says North Korea is running a secret highly enriched uranium programme in violation of a 1994 denuclearisation accord -- a charge it denies. Oil shipments under the 1994 pact are suspended.

- December: The North unseals its plutonium-producing Yongbyon reactor for the first time since 1994 and expels inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

2003

- January 10: North Korea says it will quit the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

- August 27-29: First round of six-party disarmament talks -- involving the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States -- is held in Beijing.

2005

- February 10: North Korea declares it has manufactured nuclear weapons for self-defence.

- September 19: At six-party talks, North Korea agrees to scrap its nuclear programme and return to the Non-Proliferation Treaty in return for security and diplomatic guarantees and energy aid.

- November 9-11: A new round of talks collapses, with the North insisting that US-led financial sanctions which froze its accounts in a Macau bank be lifted.

2006

- October 9: North Korea tests a nuclear weapon.

- October 31: Following secret talks with his North Korean counterpart in Beijing, US negotiator Christopher Hill announces the North has agreed to return to the six-party talks.

2007

- February 13: China announces deal under which North Korea will disable nuclear plants at Yongbyon and allow IAEA inspectors to return. In exchange it will get one million tonnes of fuel aid and be removed from a US list of terrorist states.

- July 14: First shipment of fuel aid reaches North Korea, along with IAEA inspectors. US says Yongbyon has been shut down.

- October 3: Six nations announce deal under which the North will declare all nuclear programmes and disable Yongbyon by the end of 2007. Disablement starts in November.

2008

- June 26: North Korea hands over declaration on its nuclear programme.

- August 26: North Korea says it has stopped disablement and will consider restoring the plants in protest at US failure to drop it from the terrorism blacklist. US says procedures to verify the declaration must be agreed first.

- October 11: US announces it is removing North Korea from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.

- December 8-11: Six-party talks end in stalemate after failing to agree on how to verify the North's declaration.

2009

- April 5: North Korea launches a long-range rocket which it says put a communications satellite into orbit. The United States says the launch was actually an illegal missile test.

- April 13: UN Security Council unanimously condemns North Korea for the launch and agrees to tighten existing sanctions.

- April 14: North Korea announces it will quit the six-nation talks, reopen its disabled plants and strengthen its nuclear deterrent in protest over the UN statement.

- April 29: North Korea threatens to carry out a second nuclear test unless the UN apologises.

- May 25: North carries out a second nuclear test.

-June 12: UN Security Council passes resolution enforcing new sanctions.

- December 8-10: US special envoy Stephen Bosworth holds talks in Pyongyang.

2010

- May 20: South Korea accuses North of torpedoing a warship with the loss 46 lives, clouding prospects for an early resumption of six-party talks.

- November 12: North unveils uranium enrichment plant to visiting US scientists. Experts say it could be reconfigured to make atomic weapons.

- November 23: North fires shells at South Korean island, killing four.

2011

July 22: North and South Korean nuclear envoys meet in Bali to discuss possible resumption of six-party talks.

July 28-29: Bosworth and North's first vice-foreign minister Kim Kye-Gwan hold talks in New York.

October 24-25: US and North to hold a second bilateral meeting, in Geneva. North wants unconditional resumption of six-party forum, US and South Korea say it must first take action to show it is serious about denuclearisation.