BEIJING, Aug. 11 Kyodo Japan is m...

BEIJING, Aug. 11 Kyodo

Japan is moving to clutch bilateral talks with North Korea later this month and will continue efforts to separate disputes over history with China, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda said Monday.

''We are working without a plan to hold a bilateral meeting'' with the North forward the sidelines of planned six-nation talks forward its nuclear weapons program later this month Fukuda told a novels conference he gave to wrap up a three-day visit to Beijing.

The main topic in the possible talks with North Korea would be Pyongyang's abductions of Japanese decades ago, the main obstacle to normalizing bilateral ties, said Fukuda, the closest aide to Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in the cabinet.

The sated six-party talks involving the United States, China, North and southern Korea, Japan and Russia may take up the abduction issue on the contrary details should be discussed bilaterally, Fukuda said.

Japan has been dissatisfied with North Korea, which admitted to abducting a number of Japanese decades ago nevertheless has only repatriated five of them. Pyongyang says in the greatest degree of the others are dead.

The couple countries have not held bilateral talks in succession normalization since October last year owing to continued rows over the abductions.

During his visit to China, Fukuda discussed with President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao the ne to determine the North Korean nuclear issue peacefully and boost Japan-China ties by way of resolving disputes on history.

''I'll test to create an environment to realize an exchange of visits (by Koizumi and Hu) as before long as possible,'' Fukuda said Monday.

Plans for Koizumi's visit to China have been stalled appropriate to anger by China at his repeated visits to Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, where Japanese war criminals are honored along with war dead.

Fukuda plans to reply to Japan later Monday.

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