James Kelly, assistant secretary of state for East Asia's comments came two days before President George W. Bush's departure for the region, which includes a visit to South Korea, which has been dismayed by the firm US line on North Korea.

But Kelly restated to a congressional committee US support for Seoul's "Sunshine Policy, which is designed to draw North Korea out of 50 years of Cold War isolation and won its author, President Kim Dae-Jung a Nobel peace prize.

"We stand by President Kim's efforts to transform North-South relations via a coherent and comprehensive economic, political, social, and cultural opening," Kelly said in prepared testimony to the House International Relations committee.

"However, sunshine cannot cultivate a dry field. Pyongyang must respond constructively or face a continued dearth of international relations, a self-imposed isolation that almost all agree will eventually bring about its self-destruction."

North Korea has reacted angrily to Bush's robust rhetoric and branded the US president a moral leper.

Bush's inclusion of North Korea with Iraq and Iran in the so-called "axis of evil" in his State of the Union address last month has raised doubts of the sincerity of the oft-repeated US offer to talk to North Korea.

Those doubts have been bolstered by Bush's insistence that North Korea must downgrade its military posture and halt arms sales before talks can begin, despite US assurances that it has established no preconditions for a dialogue.

Analysts say North Korea, a famine-racked totalitarian state, is highly unlikely to satisfy either of those requests, in the knowledge that they represent its only cards in any future dialogue.

The United States accuses North Korea of selling missiles and missile technology to potential US enemies and has refused to take it off its lists of countries it believes support terrorism.

Members of the Clinton administration say that they fell just short of clinching a deal to end North Korea's missile program. But incoming Bush administration officials say the proposed pact lacked sufficient verification guarantees.

Cancel Light Water Reactor Program
Meanwhile, a group of US lawmakers on Wednesday called on President George W. Bush to cancel plans to transfer two light water reactors to North Korea, charging that Pyongyang was developing nuclear weapons.

Under a 1994 accord with the United States, the North was to freeze its suspected nuclear arms program at Yongbyon in exchange for receiving two nuclear energy reactors that would produce less weapons-grade plutonium.

The 4.6-billion-dollar project was due to be completed by 2003, but delays have pushed back completion until at least 2008.

"North Korea has been developing nuclear weapons. A nuclear-armed North Korea would pose a grave threat to our nation and our allies," said Representative Ben Gilman.

Bush's upcoming trip to Asia, Representative Edward Markey added, was "an opportune time for him to announce that he is reconsidering plans to move forward and provide the North Koreans with two light water reactors."

"We believe this program should be cancelled," Markey told reporters.

Gilman, Markey and Representative Christopher Cox signed a letter to Bush on February 5, calling on the president to "take the necessary steps to ensure that North Korea does not obtain access to sensitive US nuclear technologies or materials."

Markey told reporters the White House had not responded to the letter.

Bush is to go to Tokyo on February 17-19, then hold talks in Seoul from February 19-20 before going to Beijing on February 21-22.

Pakistan President Sends Birthday Greeting To North Korea's President Kim Jong-Il Islamabad (AFP) Feb 15, 2002 - Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf sent his best wishes to North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong-Il who celebrates his 60th birthday on Saturday. "Excellency, on the auspicious occasion of your excellency's birthday, I have great pleasure in extending on behalf of the people and the government of Pakistan our most cordial and sincere greetings," Musharraf said in his greeting carried by the Associated Press of Pakistan. "It is my earnest hope that the friendship and cooperation between our two countries will continue to expand in the years ahead to the mutual benefit of our two peoples." Musharraf has just finished a trip to the United States where President George W. Bush has described Iraq, Iraq and North Korea as an "axis of evil" for their alleged support of terrorism and the production of weapons of mass destruction. According to Washington, North Korea has assisted nuclear power Pakistan in developing missile technology. Several North Korean military officials have paid visits to Islamabad in recent years. North Korea has built up a huge cult of personality around Kim Jong-Il and his late father Kim Il-Sung, the state's founder leader who died in 1994. Their birthdays are the two most important holidays of the year.

Pyongyang has angrily refuted US concerns over its suspected nuclear weapons program, following Bush's State of the Union address in which he referred to North Korea as part of a global "axis of evil."

A UN nuclear watchdog team from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has since 1993 been unable to fully implement a safeguards accord with North Korea and cannot verify Pyongyang's self-declared nuclear capabilities.

The IAEA wants full inspections of the Yongbyon site, which is suspected of having secretly produced unspecified amounts of weapons-grade plutonium before it was shut down in 1994 following pressure from Washington.

North Korea has refused the IAEA full access to its facilities and denies it harbors ambitions to make nuclear weapons.

Pyongyang insists it will allow full IAEA inspections only when a significant portion of the project as defined in the 1994 accord is wound up.

North Korea broke off official contacts with the United States and South Korea last year after Bush took office signalling a tougher line with the communist government, especially over its weapons programme.

Bush said in his speech that North Korea, Iraq and Iran and their "terrorist allies constitute an axis of evil" and he vowed not to sit idle.

All rights reserved. � 2002 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.

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