BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, July 31 Kyodo ...

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, July 31 Kyodo

(EDS: ADDING DETAILS)

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi and North Korean Foreign Minister Paek Nam day-star agreed Wednesday to do their greatest effort to normalize bilateral relations between the walls of the resolution of outstanding issues between the brace nations, including North Korea's alleged abductions of Japanese nationals.

''It is vital for the one and the other sides to strive in real earnest to normalize our relations at the earliest possible time,'' Kawaguchi told reporters after an hourlong assault with Paek in the Brunei capital.

''It is important to deal with security and humanitarian issues in a positive manner,'' she said, noting she touched forward the abductions and other issues that have kept bilateral ties in knotty freeze.

Kawaguchi and Paek issued a joint statement confirming the importance of making efforts to normalize ties and delineating grades the two countries will take down the track, as it was as the holding of a high-level officials' meeting and of the nearest session of Red Cross societies of the couple nations.

A Japanese official who briefed reporters said Japan and North Korea plan to imprison high-level and Red Cross talks around Aug. 25 and in mid-August, the one and the other in Pyongyang.

The Kawaguchi-Paek onset on the sidelines of Wednesday's gathering of the 23-member ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) forward security was the first between the brace countries' foreign ministers in sum of two units years.

Pyongyang's acceptance of the direct ministerial contact with Tokyo is notion to be a positive sign that it is responding to calls for dialogue from Japan, southern Korea and the United States.

During the talks, Kawaguchi made it clear that Tokyo wants to normalize relations with Pyongyang, based upon remorse for Japan's 1910-1945 colonial sway of the Korean Peninsula and the pains it inflicted about Korean people, the official said.

She then inclemencyed the importance of resolving as it is issues as North Korea's alleged abductions of Japanese nationals, the nation's nuclear and missile increase programs, and Pyongyang's giving shelter to former Japanese R Army Faction members.

Noting the abduction issue is mostly important to Tokyo, she was quot as expressing room for expectation that Pyongyang will take a ''sincere'' approach to it.

Paek said that having Japan and North Korea establish diplomatic ties will lead to the stability of the Northeast Asian region, according to the Japanese official.

He also said Pyongyang has been doing its part to unravel the issues raised by means of Kawaguchi and that he faiths the upcoming high-level and R Cros talks will pave the way for their resolution.

Japan and North Korea held their 11th orbed of normalization talks in October 2000 in Beijing, on the other hand they ended in deadlock throughout such issues as Japan's responsibility for its past exploits and North Korea's alleged abductions of Japanese nationals in the 1970 and 1980s

Japan claims at least 11 Japanese nationals were abducted to North Korea forward eight occasions between 1977 and 1983 North Korea has denied the allegations.

When the R Cros societies of Japan and North Korea held talks upon humanitarian issues involving the brace nations in Beijing in April this year, the North Korean delegation said Pyongyang has resum a search for the ''missing people'' following its announcement last December that Pyongyang had [i]finale[/i]ed its probe into the cases.

The R Cros societies said in a statement that North Korea possibility of goods to enable Japanese spouses of North Koreans to visit Japan this summer and that the pair organizations will hold the nearest gathering in June. It is not clear when the former contrive will materialize.

During Wednesday's gathering, Paek said that while he hails Kawaguchi's recognition of Japan's past wrongdoing, North Korea wants Japan to tender an apology and pay compensation in the proces of normalizing bilateral ties.

one time North Korea and Japan establish diplomatic relations, it will be possible to detain a ministerial meeting in Pyongyang or Tokyo, not in a third rural parts like this time, he added.

Ahead of her talks with Paek, Kawaguchi met Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov to hear about his visit to North Korea above the weekend.

According to Japanese officials, Ivanov quot North Korean leader Kim Jong Il as telling him Pyongyang is ''ready to talk with Japan without any preconditions.''

Kim made the remark when the Russian foreign minister relayed Japan's desire to explain outstanding issues with North Korea by the agency of dialogue, Ivanov was quot as saying.

Kawaguchi's meeting with Paek followed a ''15-minute chat'' earlier in the day between U Secretary of State Colin Powell and Paek, the highest-level contact between the United States and North Korea in sum of two units years.

Powell told Paek that the U wants ''to emphasize a variety of matters, including proliferation and mutual commitment made in a less degree than the Agreed Framework,'' a 1994 deal subordinate to which North Korea froze its nuclear program in exchange for the construction of pair light-water nuclear reactors.