By Park Song-wu
Korea Times Correspondent


BEIJING _ The six-party talks began in Beijing Tuesday, ending a 37-day recess, with North Korea sticking to its demand for peaceful nuclear energy. The United States did not show any sign of compromise either.

Before departing for Beijing, Kim Kye-gwan, the top North Korean envoy to the talks, again confirmed that his country will continue seeking the right to develop civilian nuclear facilities, including the two light-water reactors in Sinpo, South Hamkyong Province.

``We have this right, and the more important thing is that we should use this right,’’ Kim told China’s official Xinhua news agency. ``If the United States tries to set obstacles to (North Korea’s) using this right, we utterly cannot accept that.’’

Kim also said that North Korea wants to have the light-water reactors, which he described as key to solving the nuclear standoff.

``The construction of light-water reactors is closely related with the issue of building trust between the relevant parties,’’ he said. ``Building trust is the kernel to the process of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.’’

In a 1994 deal, Pyongyang obtained the two reactors in return for mothballing its nuclear weapons program.

Upon his arrival to Beijing, Christopher Hill, the U.S. top envoy to the talks, told reporters that there is a lot of work ahead.

``One thing I want to make clear is that we are ready to reach an agreement,’’ he said. ``I hope they are ready because we will be here as long as it is useful to be here.’’

Hill accompanied his South Korean counterpart Song Min-soon on the same airplane from Seoul to Beijing.

Song said that it would be difficult to predict positive results if the U.S. and North Korea do not show changes in their stances.

``If (the two sides) maintain their positions, it would be difficult to produce good results,’’ he told reporters. ``There have been no clues to lead us to expect positive results, but we don’t need to be pessimistic.’’

On Monday night in Seoul, Hill had a meeting with South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young, who headed to Pyongyang Tuesday for inter-Korean minister-level talks. Chung said he would try to assist the six-party process during his four-day stay in Pyongyang.

A banquet followed a plenary session of the six-party talks at the Diaoyutai state guesthouse in Beijing, introducing new deputy envoys from North Korea and China.

China’s Li Bin, former ambassador to South Korea, replaced Ning Fukui, who took his new post last week as ambassador in Seoul.

North Korea’s Chung Tai-yang replaced Li Gun. Diplomatic sources in Beijing said that Li, known as a hard-line communist, had frequently been involved in prickly exchanges with his U.S. counterpart Joseph DeTrani during the first session of the talks.

North Korea did not say why it replaced its deputy delegate.

The first session of the talks, which lasted 13 days, broke for a recess early last month.

im@koreatimes.co.kr