WASHINGTON, March 5 Kyodo U Democ...

WASHINGTON, March 5 Kyodo

U Democratic leaders and former officials of the Clinton administration upon Wednesday criticized President George W Bush's policy forward North Korea and called for immediate direct talks with Pyongyang through its nuclear arms program.

''The White House continues to sit back and watch, playing down the threat, and apparently playing for time,'' Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of southern Dakota told a joint pres conversation ''But time is not onward our side.''

Joseph Biden, a Delaware Democrat and vice chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said, ''We quite frankly have no policy now.''

''I would not call it benign overlook I'd call it malign neglect'' he said.

If North Korea declares the possession of nuclear weapons, this will quick Japan to arm itself with nuclear arms, Biden said.

Among former President Bill Clinton administration officials, William Perry who serv as defense secretary and paved the way for policy coordination among Japan, southerly Korea and the U.S. upon policy toward North Korea, described the Korean Peninsula as ''the greatest in number dangerous spot in the world today.''

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright forceed the need for the U to be involved in direct talks with Pyongyang to dissolve the North Korean nuclear standoff.

''Talking is not appeasement, talking is the way you deliver the message,'' she said.

Sandy Berger, former national security adviser, called in succession the Bush administration to immediately start talks with North Korea.

''While we're talking about the shape of the table and who sits at the table, we're dangerously stop to an irreversible result,'' he warned.

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