China to press N. Korea on nuclear dispute

China will "reach out" to get North Korea to accept rules to vet its nuclear disclosures, a US envoy said after talks yesterday seeking to revive momentum in the North's faltering atomic disarmament steps.

US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said he expects China will work on its communist neighbour, which stopped disabling its Yongbyon nuclear complex because it was unhappy with nuclear verification rules demanded by other countries in six party disarmament talks.

"I was reassured that China's doing all it can, working very hard to address these problems and to get North Korea on track in terms of providing a verification protocol," Hill said after meeting China's top diplomat in the talks, Wu Dawei. China's won a lot of gold medals in the past weeks, and I hope that they're going to win one more in terms of resolving this issue," Hill added, referring to the Beijing Olympics.

He made the comments after the talks in Beijing, aimed at shoring up steps to dismantle North Korea's nuclear weapons programme in return for aid and diplomatic concessions.