U.S. hopeful for roadmap as North Korea talks open

By Lindsay Beck

BEIJING (Reuters) - The U.S. envoy to talks on disarming North Korea was hopeful that a new negotiating session that opened on Thursday could set targets for the complete disabling of the country's nuclear programs.

Under an agreement reached on February 13, Pyongyang must disable its atomic facilities and make a complete declaration of all its nuclear programs. In return, the impoverished communist state will receive a massive injection of fuel aid.

"We hope to agree on a roadmap that will take us through to the end of the year," top U.S. negotiator Christopher Hill told reporters after the opening session of the talks, which were expected to go through Sunday.

He said the six countries at the talks -- the United States, the two Koreas, Japan, Russia and host China -- aim to begin circulating a draft text on Friday that will set targets through the end of the year, including completing disablement and declaration of the North's nuclear programs.

North Korea shut down and sealed its Soviet-era Yongbyon nuclear plant and allowed U.N. atomic energy monitors back to the site in July, its first steps in seeing through the breakthrough February 13 deal.

In return, Pyongyang has received shiploads of heavy fuel oil and held bilateral talks with the United States that could bring the fortress state out of diplomatic isolation.

But the country must still move ahead to disable its nuclear arms programs before it receives 950,000 tonnes of heavy fuel -- crucial to the North Korea, which is so poor it cannot afford fuel to run its factories or even its traffic lights.

Hill said differences between the U.S. and North Korea, the key players in the stop-start negotiations, were not intractable.

"You know, we'd like to do more. The DPRK (North Korea) likes to do less. We'll figure out a way through that," he said.

At Thursday's plenary session, Hill and North Korean counterpart Kim Kye-gwan chatted, seemingly amicably, and Kim handed Hill some papers. It was not clear what their contents were.

Wu Dawei, the chief Chinese delegate, said in an opening statement that talks were moving in the right direction but were far from over.

"A new harvest season looms in front of us," he said.

Hill warned against over-optimism and South Korea's top negotiator, Chun Yung-woo, said hurdles were bound to emerge.

"There will be some unexpected difficulties in the next phase but the (South Korean) delegation will do its best to reach the goal of the talks," China's Xinhua news agency quoted Chun as saying on Wednesday.

The talks could also be clouded by animosity between Japan and North Korea over the issue of Japanese citizens the North abducted in the 1970s and 1980s, and by speculation that a September 6 Israeli air strike on Syria may have been triggered by concerns that Syria received nuclear help from North Korea.