Japan's Akitaka Saiki met his South Korean counterpart Kim Sook over lunch in Seoul and "had a wide-ranging exchange of opinions on the six-way talks," said foreign ministry spokesman Moon Tae-Young.

The spokesman gave no details, but Kim was expected to brief Saiki on a recent trip by South Korean experts to the North's main nuclear complex at Yongbyon.

The team was considering buying unused fuel rods as part of efforts to disable the North's plutonium-producing plants under a six-nation 2007 accord. Seoul has expressed interest in using the rods in its civilian reactors.

Japanese public broadcaster NHK said Kim and Saiki agreed that it would be important for Japan, the United States and South Korea to cooperate to move the six-way talks forward.

"I believe it is important first of all for Japan, the United States and South Korea to coordinate views," Saiki reportedly said after talks with Kim.

"I don't think it will produce a desired result if we resume the six-party talks in a haphazard manner."

The two also agreed there was no change in their efforts to put down in writing the method of verifying North Korea's nuclear arms programmes, NHK said.

Meanwhile, Russia's chief nuclear envoy Alexei Borodavkin met North Korea's foreign minister Pak Ui-Chun on Thursday, Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency said.

Borodavkin handed Pak a gift for the North's leader Kim Jong-Il, it said.

Borodavkin is also scheduled to hold talks in Pyongyang on Thursday with the chief North Korean delegate to six-party talks on dismantling the North's nuclear programmes, said Itar-Tass, Russia's official news agency.

The disarmament talks are stalled by disagreements over how the North's declared nuclear activities should be verified. The forum groups the two Koreas, China, Russia, the United States and Japan.

Yonhap news agency said Saiki was also likely to seek Seoul's cooperation in arranging a meeting between former North Korean spy Kim Hyun-Hee and the relatives of a kidnapped Japanese woman.

Kim Hyun-Hee, who was sentenced to death for blowing up a South Korean airliner in 1987 but later pardoned, told local media this month she wants to meet the relatives of Yaeko Taguchi, who was abducted by North Korea in 1978.

Kim said Taguchi had taught her Japanese while she was being trained as an agent in the North.

North Korea admitted in 2002 to having kidnapped 13 Japanese nationals in the 1970s and 1980s to train its spies in Japanese language and culture.

It returned five victims and their families but said the others, including Taguchi, had died.

Japan believes many are still alive and barred from leaving because they know too many secrets. Tokyo demands that the North account for them before it contributes energy aid under the six-nation deal.

earlier related report
SKorea welcomes NKorean leader's nuclear comments
South Korea Wednesday welcomed reports that North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has expressed willingness to push ahead with six-nation nuclear disarmament talks.

In a meeting with visiting Chinese officials last week, Kim was quoted as saying he hopes to work with Beijing to advance the negotiations.

Kim, quoted by China's official Xinhua news agency, also said his country is committed to a nuclear-free Korean peninsula and does not want to raise tensions with the South.

"The government appreciates the remarks positively...and reaffirms its standing position that it will pursue the development of inter-Korean ties through dialogue," said Kim Ho-Nyoun, spokesman for the South's unification ministry which handles cross-border ties.

"We hope the North will terminate all measures that enhance tensions and hinder cooperation at the earliest possible date, and respond positively to our offer for dialogue so that inter-Korean cooperative ties can be expanded."

The North Korean leader's reported comments contrast with the stance of his military, which on January 17 threatened an "all-out confrontational posture" against Seoul.

The South put its military on alert after the remarks, which followed months of cross-border tensions.

On the same day Pyongyang said it might not give up its nuclear weapons even after establishing diplomatic ties with Washington, as long as a US "nuclear threat" remained.

But the North has also sent some apparently conciliatory signals to the new US administration. A New Year policy-setting editorial carried no criticism of the United States.

China hosts the talks on nuclear disarmament which also group the two Koreas, the United States, Japan and Russia.

They became bogged down in the final months of George W. Bush's administration over ways to verify the North's declared nuclear activities.

Kim's meeting in Pyongyang with Wang Jiarui, a senior official with China's Communist Party, was the first known one with a foreign visitor since Kim's reported stroke last August.

South Korean analysts said it shows that Kim, who turns 67 next month, has recovered.

They said China may be trying to persuade its ally to push ahead with the disarmament talks now the new US administration has taken office.

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