NORTH KOREA:North Korean leader Kim Jong-il joked about his health during talks with South Korea's president Roh Moo-hyun at the state guest house in Pyongyang - a sign of warmer relations at the first pan-Korean summit in seven years.
Mr Roh was "satisfied with the outcome of the talks", and the two sides were due to draft a communique by this morning, when the talks are scheduled to end. Mr Roh says the summit is aimed at easing tensions between the foes along the cold war's last frontier and help boost the economy of his northern neighbour.
The South Korean delegation "raised almost all agenda items that we have brought", he said, adding there had been progress on issues such as establishing peace on the Korean peninsula; economic co-operation; reconciliation and co-operation.
Mr Roh is only the second head of state from Seoul to visit the communist state, and Mr Kim's every gesture is interpreted on prime-time television in the South for signs of warmth or hostility.
The reclusive Mr Kim's less than effusive greeting for the South Korean leader on arrival in Pyongyang was widely read as a sign of cooler relations. When Mr Roh's predecessor, Kim Dae-jung, went there in 2000, the two leaders held hands, embraced warmly and sang songs together.
There had been speculation about Mr Kim's health following his rather haggard appearance on Tuesday. A team of German doctors visited Pyongyang in May to conduct a heart operation, and South Korean intelligence officials believe Mr Kim (65) has long suffered from diabetes and heart problems.
Mr Roh thanked Mr Kim for his surprise appearance the previous day to welcome him, to which Mr Kim, looking more animated, quipped: "How can I, not a patient, stay at home lazing around when Mr President came here?"
The summit takes place against a backdrop of agreement between the US and regional powers at China-hosted arms talks. In Beijing, China's vice-foreign minister Wu Dawei said the North would give a "complete and correct declaration" of all its nuclear programmes by the end of the year. This is the furthest advance yet in negotiations about how Pyongyang will give up its nuclear programme in exchange for energy aid and other economic fillips, as well as ending its status as the international community's bogeyman.
It's almost exactly one year since North Korea detonated a nuclear device, earning the opprobrium of the international community. Washington believes the North has enough plutonium to make eight or nine nuclear bombs, which could be used against South Korea or Japan.
Since then, six-party talks in Beijing involving the two Koreas, Japan, Russia, the US and China have eased the situation and Washington yesterday gave its seal of approval to the tentative deal for North Korea to reveal the full extent of its nuclear programmes and to shut its Yongbyon atomic plant.
The Pyongyang summit is being keenly observed in the wealthy South, where people appear more worried about the potentially disastrous effects of economic collapse north of the border than they are of the military threat posed by Pyongyang's formidable army and artillery pointed at Seoul.
With five months to go until elections in South Korea, opposition politicians in Seoul say Mr Roh's chief aim is to boost his standing at home rather than deal with the thornier issues on the peninsula. The delegation brought gifts with them, including a batch of South Korean soap operas banned in the North. The DVD stack included Jewel in the Palace, which stars Mr Kim's favourite actress, Lee Yong-ae. He also received boxes of tea and a painted screen.