U.S. Wants to Expand Talks With N. Korea

WASHINGTON —  The United States wants next week’s six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear arms program to lead to more regular contacts to discuss dismantling the reclusive state’s suspected weapons programs.

After the last talks in August ended inconclusively, diplomats had to work for six months for a resumption and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said Friday that he wanted to formalize a system for the discussions.

“I ... want to see if we cannot regularize this in a way so it doesn’t just become every six months ‘we’ll see if we have a meeting.’ And so I would like to see working groups created that could stay in more regular session with each other,” Powell said in an interview with Knight Ridder news service. “We’ll see whether or not that’s achievable next week,” he added.

It was the first time Powell had expressed a wish that such groups be organized out of Wednesday’s talks. Besides the U.S. and host China, the talks would involve North and South Korea, Russia and Japan.

The United States has said its basic aim is to have communist North Korea commit by the end of this round of talks to dismantling any nuclear arms programs.

Washington has offered to then lay out in detail how it will guarantee not to attack the state, which President Bush has called part of an “axis of evil,” alongside Iran and Iraq.