North Korea wants sanctions dropped and the United States to free its overseas bank accounts as preconditions for dismantling its nuclear programme, a news agency said on Wednesday, terms likely to become a sticking point in negotiations. North Korean envoy Kim Kye-gwan made the demands in meetings in Beijing on Tuesday with representatives of other countries in six-party talks on ending the NorthÂ’s nuclear weapons programme, South KoreaÂ’s Yonhap news agency said, citing a source in Beijing.
North Korea agreed to return to the talks - which involve South Korea, China, Japan, Russia and the United States - after its first nuclear test last month triggered UN-backed sanctions. US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill was still in preparatory talks on Wednesday afternoon, a US Embassy spokeswoman said. “Hill is still in meetings,” the spokeswoman said. “Hill will not leave Beijing tonight.”
US General BB Bell, the head of US forces in South Korea, said on Wednesday that the North was building nuclear weapons for political blackmail. “I’m not worried about their nukes militarily,” Bell said. “I see this as a political instrument much more so than I see it as a military instrument.