Senior diplomats from the United States, Japan and South Korea are expected to meet early next month to discuss possible security assurances for North Korea, a Japanese government source said today.
A Japanese government source said senior officials from the United States and its two key Asian allies were expected to hold "informal" talks aimed at working out details of a possible security guarantee for communist North Korea in exchange for the scrapping of its nuclear weapons programme.
But the source declined to give details including the exact timing and the venue for the meeting.
The source said the three countries would work out details after a high-profile visit later this month to the North Korea capital, Pyongyang, by China's parliament chief Wu Bangguo.