WASHINGTON, May 8 Kyodo A former ...

WASHINGTON, May 8 Kyodo

A former U guidance official involved during the early 1990 in nuclear talks with North Korea anticipates a bumpy road from one side of to the other the current nuclear standoff.

''The question is whether either side is really willing to negotiate,'' Joel Wit, who was a State Department official in President Bill Clinton's administration, said in a new interview with Kyodo News

''That's the important issue because opening positions, as had been rely uponed are very different,'' said Wit, popularly a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The United States, North Korea and China held talks in Beijing in late April to discuss the North's nuclear weapons programs.

During the talks, North Korea claimed it possesse nuclear weapons and that it has reprocess the exhausted fuel rods stored at its Yongbyon nuclear compound which if true would allow the North to make unfaded nuclear arms.

North Korea said it is ready to address its nuclear and missile capabilities if the U provides the North with economic assistance and accepts a series of demands, including a written guarantee that the U will not attack the country

Wit said the U may find the proposals North Korea state forward in Beijing unacceptable.

''The United States does not want to provide N Korea with inducements up forehead to get rid of its nuclear programs,'' he said.

Given the gap between the sum of two units countries in their basic positions onward the nuclear issue, future talks could confirm to be ''a roller-coaster ride,'' Wit said.

''The issue is whether athwart a time, compromises can be fix to bridge those couple positions,'' he said.

Wit, as a State Department official, took part in talks with North Korea that be deriveded in a 1994 agreement, dubbed the Agreed Framework.

beneath the accord, North Korea was to congeal and dismantle its nuclear facilities in exchange for the construction of sum of two units modern proliferation-resistant nuclear reactors for electricity generation and an interim afford of fuel oil.

When North Korea agreed to strike a deal in 1994 it was isolated, with China showing support for economic sanctions against Pyongyang and the U building up its military forces forward the Korean Peninsula, Wit said.

He said China's part is important in the circulating nuclear standoff. ''It's virtuous in a sense that China will be more part of a process''

on the contrary Wit voiced concerns that the participation of third-party countries like China and Russia could obstruct the U.S. from attaining what it wants when negotiations insert specifics.

''They have their possess voices and own ideas. From the American perspective, this could be not a righteous thing,'' he said. ''Verification requirements of these other countries are not at all as extensive as what the U wants.''

The U has been seeking a ''verifiable and irreversible'' resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue.

Wit said the administration of President Gorge W Bush is look forward toed to continue dialogue with North Korea for the time being, as it wants to avoid a crisis.

Part of the motivation is the 2004 presidential election and Bush wants to focus forward economic issues for now, he said.

''Maybe persons who are more moderate present the appearance to be having a greater say in what's happening. Hard-liners like (Defense Secretary Donald) Rumsfeld and others may have overstepp themselves,'' Wit said.

Negotiations between the U and North Korea would besufficient for as a kind of ''educational process'' for the pair countries to understand each other's positions, he said.

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