US, NKorea hold talks to break nuclear impasse

0 Comments | AFP, August, 2008

NEW YORK (AFP) — The United States and North Korea held talks Friday to break a deadlock over measures to verify Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program that could pave the way for removing the hardline communist state from a terrorism blacklist.

The talks in New York between Sung Kim, the State Department's top Korea expert, and North Korean officials were a follow-up to a meeting held about three weeks ago in Beijing over verification of the North's nuclear program declared in June, officials said.

"Obviously, they are going to talk about the six-party talks, obviously recent discussions about the verification package, which we have been calling on the North Koreans to produce," said State Department spokesman Robert Wood before the talks.

Asked whether...