Speaking With Reporters Upon Arrival at Haneda Airport

QUESTION: [inaudible]

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, first of all, let me just start by saying about two weeks ago Ken Sasae came to Washington, and we had a discussion about having intersessional meetings, that is, meetings between the sessions of the six parties. And so we discussed the idea that I might be meeting with Mr. Kim Gye Gwan at some point. And we agreed that if I did that I would come to Tokyo soon after to give a briefing, so that's why I'm here in Tokyo.

With regard to the actual meetings with Mr. Kim Gye Gwan in Berlin, I would say they were very useful discussions. They were substantive – that is, we really discussed the issues that we would face in the next round of the six-party talks. And we certainly agreed that we would go forward with the Six-Party Talks. We agreed on the need to get going with the next round, and we agreed on getting the financial talks scheduled, as well.

We don't yet have a date for either of those, but what I'm going to do is, after I have my opportunity here to consult with the Japanese Government, what I want to do is go to Beijing and have a meeting with the Chinese government, because they are the host of the talks. And any scheduling of the Six-Party Talks is really done by the Chinese government.

But before I gave our views, I wanted to get the views of the Japanese Government. As you know, we work very, very closely with the Japanese Government throughout this process, and so I just want to make sure that we have a common understanding.

QUESTION: [inaudible] reports that the meeting could be on the sixth of February for the six-party.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think the actual date for the Six-Party Talks will depend on the Chinese hosts. Presumably, what they will do is what they've done in the past, which is to ask the various participants whether they can attend on a certain date or not. And so, it may be that they've been asking people about the beginning of February, I'm not sure. We would like to get going as soon as possible. We were hoping for more progress in December than we were actually able to make. So what I would hope for is that this session, whether it’s a late January or early February session, does achieve more progress than what we were able to do in December.

QUESTION: Late January and February session means like, U.S. and North Korea having the financial talks?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: No, I think the financial talks we’re talking about… You know, depending on what the U.S. Treasury does vis-à-vis their DPRK contacts -- because, again, I don't do the scheduling for the U.S. Treasury -- but I think they’re talking about as early as next week or the week after. I mean, they have to work out precise timing. We did have some discussion on that in Berlin, but it depends on people's schedules.

With regard to the Six-Party Talks, usually we start them on Monday or Tuesday. I don't think it can be done this week. Maybe the week after or maybe the week after that. Certainly, we would like to move very quickly. But I think all countries need to figure out when they'll be ready, and most importantly, our Chinese hosts need to figure out when they can host us. You know, it's a big undertaking for them. So we'll get a better idea of that starting when I get to Beijing.

QUESTION: There are reports that Treasury is considering a partial lifting of sanctions in terms of Macao bank.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don't want to discuss any of that. Treasury had a good session -- actually two days worth of discussions with the DPRK in December. I think they had some ideas for how to proceed, and they'll be having some other meetings. But I don't want to be speaking for them. I do know that our Treasury colleagues have been working very, very hard, and I hope they can also make some progress.

QUESTION: In the next Six-Party Talks, what do you hope to achieve?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I think what we've always been looking for in the Six-Party Talks is to begin the very difficult but extremely important process of implementing the September 2005 agreement. So I think we'd be looking to try to implement some of that agreement. Now it's a big agreement. There are a lot of elements to it. There are a lot of, as we say in diplomacy, a lot of mechanisms within it. And so, we can't do it all at once. But we hope to implement some of it.

QUESTION: North Korea is going back to the NPT and IAEA?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Again, for the DPRK to get back into the NPT, they've got to get out of this nuclear weapons business that they’re in. Obviously, if you look at the text of the September 2005 agreement you'll see that they need to abandon all these weapons and these existing nuclear programs. So we would look forward to getting some progress on that. But we'll have to see. I don't want to discuss specific elements. I know you’d love me to discuss all of those, but this is a tough enough, a difficult enough business. I just don't want to make it more difficult by talking about all of this. So bear with me. Someday you can talk to me about it as historians.

QUESTION: North Korea has been refusing to do bilateral talks with Japan, but do you think at this next round it’s a possibility?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I'm not going to predict this round. I will say that I think it is very important for the DPRK and Japan to have an ability to talk to each other. There are some issues here coming from the past, which I think are of great concern to the Japanese public, and I know that there is a great interest in having discussions with the DPRK. And without giving you all the details of my discussion in Berlin, part of what I did talk about was the need to achieve better relations between all the parties of the six parties, including the DPRK and Japan. So this subject that is so difficult for Japan – I mean, these terrible things that happened some years ago, and the need to achieve clarity and closure on some of those, are issues that I can assure you are very close to me personally and very close to my country generally.

So I thank you very much. I think I have to get going and get on to having some meetings here. And tomorrow I'll get on to Beijing and the next day get on to Washington. So see you all, good to see you.