Japan to provide food aid to North Korea as talks near

Japan will provide North Korea with food aid and some $7 million worth of medical supplies, officials said on Thursday, as the two countries prepared to hold talks soon on the fate of Japanese abducted by Pyongyang decades ago.
The 125,000 tonnes of food and medical supplies are part of a pledge by Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi when he met North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang in May.
Japan's top government spokesman said the aid, to be provided through international organisations, was not linked to the talks, but Japanese media said it was aimed at inducing North Korea to make progress on its probe into the Japanese abductees.
"It has nothing to do with the talks," Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda told a news conference, but added that he hoped there would be progress on the investigation into the 10 Japanese abductees, who North Korea says are dead or missing.
Japanese media have said Japanese and North Korean officials may meet as early as next week in Beijing, and Hosoda said he expected talks to be held soon.
North Korea has softened its stance towards Japan recently in the hopes of winning badly needed economic aid, allowing the North Korean-born children of repatriated abductees to be reunited with their parents in Japan.
While Tokyo is considering whether to resume stalled talks to establish diplomatic ties with Pyongyang, officials have said it would be difficult to do so unless North Korea comes up with results on its investigation.
Tokyo has said it will offer full-scale financial aid to North Korea once diplomatic ties are established.
In their May summit, Koizumi said Tokyo would offer a total of 250,000 tonnes of food aid and $10 million of medical assistance to North Korea in a bid to alleviate the food shortage in the impoverished country.
Hosoda said Japan would likely provide the rest of the assistance it promised North Korea by early next year.
The two Koreas, the United States, Japan, Russia and China have held three rounds of talks in Beijing aimed at eliminating Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programmes and addressing the North's security and energy concerns.
They are hoping to hold working-level discussions later this month to prepare for full-fledged six-party talks they agreed to hold by the end of September.
The nuclear crisis erupted in October 2002 when US officials said the North had admitted to a covert programme to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons. Pyongyang has since denied it has such a programme.