Six-party envoys may meet in Beijing next week

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Envoys from six countries plan to meet in Beijing next week to discuss how to advance an accord under which North Korea promised to abandon its nuclear weapons and programs, a U.S. official said on Monday.

"The current planning is for the middle of next week," the official, who spoke on condition that he not be named, said of the meeting of envoys from China, Japan, the two Koreas, Russia and the United States to discuss the 2005 accord.

Stressing that the dates for such talks can slip and were for China, as the host, to announce, the official said it was possible the next round would occur on July 9 or 10.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, the lead U.S. negotiator in the "six-party" process, is expected to depart for Beijing on July 7, the official added.

On Thursday, North Korea delivered a long-delayed list of its nuclear activities, as it was required to do in the six-way disarmament-for-aid deal.

The inventory mostly outlined Pyongyang's program to produce arms-grade plutonium and experts said key questions over suspected uranium enrichment and proliferation programs were not answered.

North Korea has denied U.S. accusations of spreading nuclear technology to Syria and of having a clandestine program to enrich uranium, a process that could offer a second path to material for nuclear weapons beyond its plutonium program.

Officials involved in the talks hope to start a new round of discussions soon that will look at verification steps and at scrapping the North's nuclear weapons program in exchange for massive aid and an end to its status as a global pariah.

(Reporting by Arshad Mohammed, editing by Vicki Allen)