SEOUL - Impoverished North Korea has told the United States and South Korea it will join proposed four nation peace talks if they first guarantee substantial food aid, Seoul officials said yesterday. International aid agencies say North Korea, devastated by two consecutive years of floods, is weeks away from starvation. But South Korea and the US made clear that any major food aid could only be discussed during the peace talks.
The Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mr Lee Kyu-hyung, said Pyongyang made its first formal response on the peace talks by requesting the food aid at a New York meeting on Wednesday. The announcement came on the eve of a visit to South Korea by the US Vice President, Mr Al Gore, who was expected to discuss ways to lure Pyongyang to the talks proposed by President Clinton and President Kim Young sam of South Korea last April.