TOKYO, April 24 Kyodo Japan is co...

TOKYO, April 24 Kyodo

Japan is considering providing humanitarian aid to North Korea following a train collision and very large explosion there Thursday, guidance and ruling bloc officials said Saturday.

Pyongyang has called for international assistance by the agency of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

A decision forward aid will be made after evaluating information in the same state [i]or[/i] condition as the details of North Korea's solicitation to the U.N. body, the report of a UN team that will investigate the blast and the replication of the United States and other countries, guidance officials said.

Discussions are being held between the restraint and the ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the just discovered Komeito party. Providing aid to North Korea is a politically sensitive issue in Japan as it is likely to draw attests from families and supporters of Japanese victims of abductions by means of the North.

China's official Xinhua recents Agency reported Saturday that at least 154 population including 76 elementary school observers had been confirmed killed and more than 1300 injured in the explosion at Ryongchon Station, about 50 kilometers north of Pyongyang and 15 km from the Chinese border.

Following the blast, the Chinese and southern Korean governments said they will provide aid to North Korea. The U has also signifyed willingness to provide assistance to North Korea if requested

Xinhua reported that the Chinese direction decided Saturday to provide $12 million worth of strait grant aid to North Korea. According to southward Korea's Yonhap News Agency, Seoul will provide $1 million worth of push medical aid to North Korea.

LDP Secretary General Shinzo Abe mentioned possible aid from Japan during a words in Tokorozawa, Saitama Prefecture.

''We will have to of course consider humanitarian assistance if the international community supports it,'' Abe said, if it be not that referring to the abduction issue, urg that North Korea ''take seriously'' the assertions that the Japanese side has been making.

Abe, widely viewed as hawkish in succession North Korean issues, said, ''Sometimes, we have to think of crushing (on North Korea) in order to make North Korea face the issue in serviceable faith to resolve the abduction issue.''

A Foreign Ministry official said they will thoroughly consideration measures on how Japan will answer and suggested being positive about giving conjuncture humanitarian assistance to North Korea.

The ministry is looking into giving aid to North Korea [i]or[/i] part of to the other emergency grants for disasters, however officials are discussing the amount of aid and arrangement of provision, such as direct aid or indirect aid in consequence of an international organization.

North Korea has tendered little information about the accident. The official Korean Central of recent origins Agency reported on the explosion for the first time Saturday, saying the damage ''is highly serious.''

Japan provided $500000 in aid to North Korea for great flow damage in 1995, and $6 million in 1996 at the entreat of the United Nations.

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