Two GOP senators join in call for direct US-North Korea talks

WASHINGTON -- Two leading Republican senators joined Democrats yesterday in calling for direct talks with North Korea aimed at easing a nuclear standoff.

Senator Richard Lugar, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said direct talks, which the North long has coveted and which the Bush administration refuses, are "inevitable if this is to be resolved diplomatically."

Calls for such talks have grown louder following North Korea's nuclear test Oct. 9 and as diplomats worry about a second detonation.

The administration says it will only have such talks during six-nation negotiations meant to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear programs. Those talks have been stalled for nearly a year.

Republican Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the "issue is serious enough with North Korea, with their having nuclear weapons and the capacity to deliver them, that I think we ought to use every alternative, including direct bilateral talks."

One day, said Lugar, Republican of Indiana, an American president will be talking directly to North Korean leader Kim Jong Il "and his people and saying, in essence, in terms they can understand, `We are not going to overthrow you; we are not involved in regime change; you're going to stay.' . . . I hope it happens sooner rather than later."

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ended a weeklong trip yesterday to Asia and Russia to rally support for enforcing a UN Security Council resolution that punishes North Korea for the nuclear test.

A report yesterday said Kim told a Chinese envoy that future nuclear tests will hinge on US policy toward his country. Kim also said he thinks Washington is trying to crush North Korea with its hostile policy and complained about US financial penalties, the Kyodo News agency in Japan reported.

Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, said Japan, Russia, China, and South Korea -- the other members of the six-nation talks -- have privately urged the United States to allow direct talks with the North.

Lugar and Biden appeared on "Fox News Sunday," while Specter was on CNN's "Late Edition."