North Korea Storms Out of Economic Talks

Chin Dong-soo, left, who leads the South's government delegation to North Korea, receives a bouquet of flowers from a North Korean woman upon his arrival at Pyongyang airport in Pyongyang, North Korea, Wednesday, April 18, 2007. A South Korean delegation arrived in North Korea to discuss possible aid despite North Korea's failure to make progress on an international agreement to dismantle its nuclear programs. (AP Photo/Park Min-kue, Korea Pool) (Park Min-kue - AP)

SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea's chief envoy stormed out of economic talks with South Korea on Thursday after the South urged its neighbor to honor its nuclear disarmament pledge.

South Korea had wanted to use this week's meetings in Pyongyang to press the communist country to implement a Feb. 13 agreement to start dismantling its atomic weapons programs, possibly using rice aid as leverage.

The North failed to meet a Saturday deadline under the pact to shut down its sole operating nuclear reactor, saying it wanted to make sure a separate financial dispute was resolved first.

South Korea's chief delegate, Chin Dong-soo, urged North Korea to quickly implement the nuclear deal, saying it would be "a shortcut to draw firm support from the international community on inter-Korean economic cooperation," South Korean spokesman Kim Jung-tae said, according to pool reports.

The North's chief delegate, Ju Dong Chan, made unspecified angry comments to South Korean officials and walked out, the reports said.

Ju objected to tying the nuclear deal to inter-Korean economic cooperation, Kim said.

The North also rejected calls from a Washington lawmaker to return a U.S. warship captured in 1968 while on an intelligence-gathering mission off the North Korean coast.

"Return? What do you mean by return? (The ship) is such an important thing," Ju told Chin, who asked about the USS Pueblo during a lunch meeting that preceded the economic talks.

"As we already decided not to do that, that's it," Ju said, shaking his head.

The Pueblo is now on display beside a Pyongyang river, the only active-duty U.S. warship in the hands of a foreign power.

In Washington, Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., reintroduced a resolution Wednesday demanding that North Korea return the ship and sent a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggesting she look into the matter.

The economic talks had been delayed nearly eight hours after North Korea demanded to see a draft statement in which South Korea pledged to provide rice aid to the North even before negotiations began, pool reports said. The North later withdrew the demand.