FOCUS: LEAD: Japan walks tightrope on abductions as N. Korea takes denuke steps

BEIJING, July 19 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATING 3RD GRAF, ADDING INFO IN 4TH GRAF WITH NEW DEVELOPMENTS)

As North Korea implements steps toward denuclearization and inches closer to the United States, Japan is walking on a tightrope to find a way out of its thorny dispute with North Korea over the past abductions of Japanese nationals.

At the same time, there are views within the Japanese government that Japan need not be worried or wary as it has bargaining chips, chiefly its position as the world's No. 2 economic power, to persuade North Korea to come around on the abduction issue.

In the latest round of six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear programs in Beijing, top Japanese and North Korean nuclear negotiators met bilaterally for about an hour Thursday and agreed to make ''mutual'' efforts to resolve pending issues between the two nations and move the six-party talks forward.

But both sides refused to disclose further details about the bilateral talks.

Kenichiro Sasae, Japan's six-party chief delegate and director general of the Foreign Ministry's Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, told reporters after the first day of the talks Wednesday that he reiterated Japan's policy of first seeking headway on the abduction issue.

Tokyo maintains it will not participate in energy and economic aid to North Korea unless there is progress on the abduction issue -- a stance which observers say is isolating Japan in the six-party process.

A government source disagrees, however, saying the four other parties in the six-nation talks -- the United States, China, South Korea and Russia -- in fact concur with Japan and are urging North Korea to resume sessions with Japan of a bilateral working group at an early date with the understanding that good Japan-North Korea ties will lead to peace and security in Northeast Asia.

The working group was set up under the six-party framework in a bid to address the abduction and other pending bilateral issues between Tokyo and Pyongyang and normalize diplomatic ties. It held its inaugural meeting in March in Hanoi, which ended without progress.

''All participating nations share the view that Japan's participation in the energy aid is necessary and for that to happen, the abduction issue must be addressed and cannot be left behind,'' the source said.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Christopher Hill, Sasae's U.S. counterpart, has repeatedly told reporters he raises the issue of the abductions ''every time'' he meets the North Koreans and reminds them that getting along with Japan, the world's No. 2 economy, is in North Korea's interests.

But political pundits say Japan is being pressed to shift from its current hard-line policy on North Korea now that the denuclearization process is moving forward and its key ally, the United States, is making concessions to North Korea.

''At a time when things are moving in the six-party talks and U.S.-North Korea ties, at a time when the abduction issue is stalled, it is important and indispensable for Japan to take part in the aid as the next phase moves forward and use this to encourage Japan-North Korea dialogue,'' said Lee Young Hwa, a Kansai University professor specializing in the North Korean economy.

North Korea is keen on normalizing bilateral ties with Japan as soon as possible but before it does so, it needs Japan to first take a step and open the way for dialogue, Lee said.

Political critic Minoru Morita too warned that the administration of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe needs to rethink its North Korean policy if it wants to make headway on the abduction issue.

''It is reckless to think of resolving the abduction issue without any bilateral dialogue and simply by being tough on North Korea and cornering it until North Korea caves in,'' Morita said, adding that Japan has relied too much on the United States to help resolve the abduction issue.

North Korea admitted in 2002 that it had abducted and taken to its territory 13 Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s, saying eight of them had subsequently died. The other five have been repatriated to Japan.

Pyongyang has since said the abduction issue has been dealt with but Japan disputes that, demanding that North Korea reinvestigate the abductions and return what it believes are surviving abductees. The abduction issue is the key stumbling block to normalizing bilateral ties.

To break the stalemate between Tokyo and Pyongyang, which remain at odds also over the number and fate of the people abducted in the 1970s and 1980s, Japan needs to find an ''exit policy,'' a separate government source said.

Japan has diplomatic cards which it can use to its favor at the right time, Lee said. One such card is lifting the economic sanctions it imposed on the energy-starved, impoverished nation after the North conducted missile and nuclear tests last year.

''What is important is for North Korea to make itself accountable on this issue,'' Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman Tomohiko Taniguchi said. ''One should expect that Pyongyang is going to come forward with accountable, verifiable, and honest information as to what has happened to the abductees and their whereabouts.''