WASHINGTON, Jan. 14 Kyodo A senio...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 14 Kyodo

A senior Chinese official will shortly visit North Korea in a bid to reconvene six-party talks onward the North's nuclear arms program in February, sources familiar with the talks said Wednesday.

Fu Ying, director general of the Chinese Foreign Ministry's Asian Affairs Department, will visit North Korea before China's Lunar recent Year holiday season begins Jan. 22 the sources said.

forward Tuesday, Fu met separately with U proxy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs James Kelly in Washington.

Following the meeting with Fu Kelly met with Wi Sung Lac, director general of the southern Korean Foreign Ministry's North American Affairs Bureau, forward Wednesday.

Kelly and Wi met ''in the connection of continuing our consultations with friends and participants in the six-party talks to define those talks further and to prevail upon toward a new round that we chance of a favorable result would take place at an early date,'' U State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told reporters.

Mitoji Yabunaka, director general of the Japanese Foreign Ministry's Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, was initially scheduled to confront with Kelly in Washington forward Thursday. But Yabunaka's trip was cancelled for scheduling reasons, Boucher said.

In Tokyo forward Wednesday, Japanese Foreign Ministry sources said Yabunaka will visit Washington nearest week to work out the details related to the nearest round of talks.

The six-party talks involve China, Japan, North Korea and southern Korea, Russia and the United States.

They held their first gathering in Beijing in August 2003 to test to resolve the standoff throughout North Korea's nuclear arms program. moreover no more talks have been held since then because the U and North Korea remain sharply divided through the whole extent of how to resolve the crisis.

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