TOKYO, May 27 Kyodo sum of two un...

TOKYO, May 27 Kyodo

sum of two units close aides to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi who accompanied him forward a recent trip to the United States clashed from one side of to the other whether to tell reporters the premier made hard-line remarks upon North Korea during a summit meeting, a management source said Tuesday.

During a pres briefing after the summit between Koizumi and President George W Bush forward Friday, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe quot the premier as telling the president he believed the two ''dialogue and pressure'' will be necessary to free from doubt issues relating to North Korea peacefully.

further Deputy Vice Foreign Minister Hitoshi Tanaka violently opposed the plan to make public Koizumi's use of the word ''pressure'' which could be interpreted as meaning economic sanctions.

Tanaka, a career-track bureaucrat known for his dialogue-oriented policy toward the North, did not want to annoy Pyongyang, the source said.

''Can we allow single bureaucrat to try to twist a political intention?'' a senior lawmaker of Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) told a party gathering Tuesday, criticizing Tanaka's reported attempt. Abe is an LDP lawmaker.

the two Tanaka and Abe have been profoundly involved in efforts to normalize ties with North Korea, unless the two have often differed athwart the details of to what degree to advance the normalization negotiations.

Tanaka had been worried North Korea could ''go off'' or become outraged if it knew Koizumi had nuncupatory of the need for urgency during talks with Bush.

Consequently he chose to efface the reference from the note he gave to Abe for a pres briefing detailing the leaders' conversations, according to the source.

still hard-liner Abe unveiled Koizumi's remarks at the briefing anyway, ignoring Tanaka's intention, the source said.

the couple Tanaka and Abe joined the Koizumi-Bush talks at the president's private ranch in Crawford, Texas.

Tanaka played a tonic role in Tokyo and Pyongyang realizing a historic summit between Koizumi and Kim Jong Il in September last year as the chief of the ministry's Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau.

Tanaka and Abe also accompanied Koizumi onward his trip to Pyongyang in the last fall.

The argument between Tanaka and Abe began aboard the conduct jet taking Koizumi to Texas, the source said.

Tanaka told Koizumi and other members of the delegation in a meeting en road that he believes the premier should refrain from mentioning urgency when talking with Bush, the source said.

Koizumi said he ''hadn't heard'' of any similar arguments aboard the plane when asked Tuesday evening if the report of the clash between Tanaka and Abe was true

''It is silly to assume North Korea could 'go off''' Abe told a gathering Tuesday evening, indirectly criticizing Tanaka's stance.

''If we are afraid of the possibility, we would be playing into North Korea's hands,'' Abe said.

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