SEOUL, South Korea — A senior nuclear negotiator from North Korea will visit Beijing for a strategic dialogue this week, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said Monday.
The planned trip by the first vice foreign minister of North Korea, Kim Kye-gwan, follows his country’s proposal on Sunday to hold senior-level talks with Washington to discuss easing tensions and eventually removing nuclear weapons from the Korean Peninsula.
Mr. Kim, a veteran diplomat and a central figure in North Korea’s negotiations with the outside world over its nuclear weapons programs, is scheduled to meet with the Chinese vice foreign minister, Zhang Yesui, in Beijing on Wednesday, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman told reporters at a press briefing.
The two will discuss bilateral relations and the situation on the Korean Peninsula, said the spokeswoman, Hua Chunying.
Mr. Kim is the second senior North Korean envoy to visit China, the North’s last remaining major ally, in recent weeks. Vice Marshal Choe Ryong-hae, a top North Korean military leader, met President Xi Jinping in Beijing late last month. Mr. Choe reportedly told the Chinese leader that North Korea was willing to return to negotiations after having spent March and April issuing bellicose statements, including threats of nuclear strikes at Washington and Seoul.
Mr. Kim’s planned trip to Beijing also coincides with a gathering of the envoys of the United States and its two Asian allies, South Korea and Japan, that is scheduled for Wednesday in Washington. The three allies are to discuss the North’s recent overtures of dialogue and coordinate their approaches.
President Obama and his South Korean counterpart, Park Geun-hye, discussed the issue by telephone on Sunday evening. They agreed to close “coordination” on North Korea, both governments said.
China hopes that it can work with North Korea to restart broader six-party talks — also including Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States — with the goal of ending the North’s nuclear weapons programs, Ms. Hua said. Beijing is the host of the multilateral forum and is eager to resume the talks, which were last held in 2008.
But Washington and its allies have been skeptical of resuming what they call “talks for talks’ sake.” The initial United States response to the North Korean offer for bilateral dialogue has also been cool.
Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the United States National Security Council, said in a statement that while Washington was open to dialogue, it would “judge North Korea by its actions and not its words, and look forward to seeing steps that show North Korea is ready to abide by its commitments and obligations.”
The North demanded talks “without preconditions” on Sunday.
Suspicions run deep among American officials that North Korea has been offering dialogue after provocations only to win concessions and then resort again to raising tensions. And they have insisted that North Korea first take concrete steps to demonstrate a willingness to abandon its nuclear weapons programs before Washington re-engages in diplomatic discussions.
That American approach is shared by South Korean officials.
Unification Minister Ryoo Kihl-jae of South Korea told Parliament on Monday that he saw little chance of a United States-North Korean dialogue happening soon. His spokesman, Kim Hyung-suk, said, “What is important is that North Korea should show a sincere attitude for denuclearization, and show it through concrete actions.”
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