Leader Kim Jong-il agreed North Korea would join a first round of six-party working level talks on his nuclear programmes on May 12 after a visit to China this month, media and officials said on Thursday.
The lower-level talks to focus on detail rather than strategy would be the first concrete result of two rounds of high-level talks involving China, Russia, the two Koreas, the United States and Japan in Beijing in the past year on North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions.
The breakthrough came when the reclusive Kim made a rare visit to Beijing this month and met Chinese President Hu Jintao to set the May 12 date, Japan's Kyodo news agency said.
Kim's trip came just days after a visit to Beijing by US Vice President Dick Cheney, who brought more evidence of North Korea's efforts to develop a nuclear force.
"There is no period set, there are no specific topics fixed," South Korean Vice Foreign Minister Lee Soo-hyuck told reporters.
The nuclear crisis erupted in October 2002 when US officials say communist North Korea disclosed it was working on a secret programme to enrich uranium for weapons, in violation of an international agreement.
North Korea said it expected to discuss a reward for freezing its nuclear plans but any breakthrough depended on Washington.
"The DPRK side will attend this meeting to discuss the proposal 'reward for freeze'," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the official KCNA news agency. DPRK is short for the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
The proposal involves the North freezing nuclear plans in return for compensation.
The two protagonists to the talks are at odds on many issues, including how to proceed on a US offer to provide security assurances if North Korea agrees to the complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantling of its nuclear arms programmes.