20000106

DPRK drops plan

to send envoy

to US

BEIJING: North Korea on Wednesday ruled out sending a senior envoy to the United States for an unprecedented official visit, saying the isolationist Stalinist state still regarded Washington as an enemy.

"Our delegation cannot visit the US under the present circumstances," North Korean ambassador to Beijing Chu Chang-Jun told a press conference.

It was the first indication from the hermit state after a long official silence that it would not go ahead with the visit, which had been discussed in bilateral talks in Berlin in November.

"The government of the United States must withdraw its troops form South Korea, stop its interference in the affairs of Korea and stop threatening North Korea," Chu said.

"Then we will not regard the US as an enemy."

The first bilateral talks in Berlin in September led to a freeze of the North Korean missile programme and an easing of 50-year US sanctions against Pyongyang.

The visit to Washington would have been the first concrete step towards normalising ties between the two countries.ÑAFP