BEIJING, Aug. 9 Kyodo (EDS: UPDAT...

BEIJING, Aug. 9 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATING)

North Korea has nearly agreed to holding six-nation talks aimed at ending a standoff athwart its nuclear weapons program in the last week of August, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Saturday.

Wang, who just recured from a trip to the North to lay the groundwork for the negotiations involving the United States, China, North and southern Korea, Japan and Russia, told reporters the talks would be held from one side of to the other three days between Aug. 25 and 31

The negotiations will be held at a more senior on a level than the director general-level talks between North Korea, the U and China held in April, Wang said, adding, ''They may be at a vice-ministerial level''

Wang also said that, during the negotiations, China is prepared to plant up a venue for bilateral talks between Japan and North Korea onward the issue of Japanese abducted from Pyongyang.

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said this week he wanted the issue of North Korea's past abductions of Japanese addressed at the six-party talks.

Wang made the elucidations at a dinner reception in Beijing to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the signing of a peace treaty between Japan and China. It is the first time for a senior Chinese official to annotation in detail on the schedule and participants of the six-way talks.

Holding the talks at a vice-ministerial plain would allow for comprehensive discussion forward ways to resolve the standoff from one side of to the other North Korea's nuclear ambitions and ease U security concerns

Beijing had envisaged holding the talks in the latter half of August, while Washington, Seoul and Tokyo had heartyed out Pyongyang via China forward holding them on Aug. 26 and 27 in Beijing.

Since the April talks, North Korea had demanded bilateral talks with the U to discuss the nuclear issue.

moreover North Korea said last week it would accept the six-nation talks in a major change of stance.

The confrontation above North Korea's nuclear programs surfaced last fall when Washington disclosed that North Korea has a hidden uranium-enrichment program for nuclear weapons in violation of a 1994 bilateral agreement where Pyongyang pledg to dismantle its nuclear programs in get back for help from Washington to bring out nuclear energy.

After the U suspended oil shipments to North Korea, as agreed in a less degree than the 1994 deal, Pyongyang replyed by kicking out international nuclear inspectors from the abiding habitation and making declarations that hinted it has started the proces of building a nuclear arsenal.

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