U.S. expects hard North Korea talks

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Top U.S. nuclear envoy Christopher Hill said on Friday he expects difficult six-party talks next week on North Korea's nuclear disarmament and that more work needs to be done to iron out verification details.

Hill, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asia, met North Korean nuclear envoy Kim Kye-gwan in Singapore for two days of discussions to set the tone for the six-party talks in Beijing next week.

"I can't say we have agreed on anything at this point, but we certainly had a good exchange of views on primarily the issue of the level of specificity and what verification is going to look like," Hill told reporters after the talks.

"I'm sure the negotiations will be as usual, difficult."

Analysts said the six-party talks in Beijing take on extra importance because they are the last under U.S. President George W. Bush and North Korea may try to extract concessions from an outgoing administration keen to score diplomatic success.

Many obstacles have held up the disarmament agreement struck in October during stop-start negotiations between North and South Korea, China, the United States, Japan and Russia.

There had been concern the latest round in Beijing, which have not been formally announced, might not proceed. Kim said he saw no reason they should not go ahead.

"There hasn't been official announcement, but we have no objections," he told reporters after meeting Hill.

Under the disarmament agreement reached in October, Pyongyang has been offered fuel oil and other aid, as well as greater diplomatic standing, in return for shutting a key nuclear installation and handing over a list of its atomic activities.

Kim said the North was still waiting on fuel deliveries agreed to under the disarmament deal, and that work disabling the nuclear site would be finished when it is handed over.

"There are still 450,000 tonnes of heavy fuel oil remaining (to be sent). When it all arrives, disablement will be complete, and we have finished preparations for that," Kim said.

DIVISIVE ISSUES

Another impediment has been the North's reluctance to allow international inspectors to take nuclear samples out of the country for testing. Washington maintains that, under agreements reached in October, Pyongyang is obliged to allow such tests.

Hill said the divisive issue of sampling would be difficult to resolve and that both sides needed to be satisfied with the wording of how it is to be achieved.

"If sampling is put on paper then the DPRK (North Korea) may feel like it is losing there, if it is not on paper then we will be losing and so we get to kind of a tough patch in terms of how to express these things where everybody feels they're winning," Hill said.

Kim told reporters that the issue of sampling was one of methodology and that discussions about it will continue.

Pyongyang carried out a nuclear blast in October 2006, alarming the region and galvanizing the six-party negotiations that began in Beijing in 2003.

Hill declined to comment on the future of the six-party talks and said his interest was in settling on a verification protocol before leaving it to U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's incoming administration to decide what to do next.

Hill refused to say whether he was seeking a position in the Obama administration.

He will hold meetings in Seoul on Saturday before heading to Beijing on Sunday.

(Additional reporting by Vivek Prakash in SINGAPORE and Jack Kim in SEOUL; Editing by Paul Tait)