Zero progress at North Korean nuclear arms talks

Talks on dismantling North Korea's nuclear weapons programmes sank into deadlock on Thursday, with Washington and Pyongyang at odds over the North's insistence on its right to a nuclear energy programme.
Failure to reach an accord at the Beijing talks could prompt the United States to take the issue to the UN Security Council and press for sanctions. China opposes such a move, and communist North Korea has said sanctions would be tantamount to war.
After three days of talks, the US and North Korean delegations were as far apart as ever. "There wasn't any progress today," chief US negotiator Christopher Hill told reporters after a 90-minute meeting with the North Koreans.
"The DPRK made very clear that they will not dismantle the existing nuclear programmes until they receive a light-water reactor. No delegation is prepared to offer North Korea a light-water reactor."
DPRK stands for the reclusive state's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Host China also sounded a negative note after a meeting of chief delegates from the six parties in the talks - the two Koreas, the United States, Japan, Russia and host China. "There are still great differences on certain issues," Xinhua news agency quoted Chinese spokesman Liu Jianchao as saying.
Urging patience, Liu said the talks would resume on Friday. But Hill said there may come a point where all delegates look at setting a deadline: "We are not there yet," he added.
North Korea stood firm on its demand for a reactor that generates electricity but is unsuitable for making nuclear arms.
"The issue of light-water reactor is one that's related to the political commitment by the United States to clear its hostility against us and to peacefully co-exist," a spokesman for the North Korean delegation told reporters. "We are demanding something specific, not an empty right to peaceful nuclear activities. All the countries have expressed understanding of our position, but only the United States is adamantly against it."
But Hill said it was Pyongyang that stood alone. "The DPRK, not for the first time, has chosen to isolate itself," he said of its reactor demand. "Today, one didn't get much sense that the DPRK was going to change its mind on this."
Washington - which once bracketed North Korea with Iran and pre-war Iraq in an "axis of evil" - says Pyongyang must dismantle all nuclear programmes verifiably and irreversibly, after which it can expect energy aid and security guarantees. The impoverished North wants the aid and guarantees first, as well as the right to keep civilian nuclear programmes.