Diplomats have said that North Korea needs to rejoin talks on ending its nuclear programs if it wants concessions from the international community.

The Yonhap News Agency reported on Friday that nuclear negotiators from Japan and South Korea urged North Korea to return to the six-nation talks, last held in December 2008.

The negotiations involved North Korea, South Korea, China, Japan, the United States and Russia.

Washington, Jan 12 - US Monday rejected North Korea's proposal to discuss a peace treaty saying Pyongyang should first take steps towards denuclearisation.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters Pyongyang has to come back to the six-party talks and take steps towards denuclearisation for peace treaty issue to advance, Xinhua reported.

"If they're willing to live up to those obligations, then we will make progress in those talks," Gibbs said in a media briefing. This is not a step for the US to take, but rather a step for North Korea, he said.

Pyongyang, Jan. 4 : The declaration of a “peace offensive” by North Korea aimed at pacifying relations with the US could lead to the resumption of six-party talks, but Pyongyang hasn’t given any indication as to whether it is willing to give up its nuclear program.

London, Jan. 1 : North Korea has called for an end to hostile relations with the United States, official news agency KCNA reported.

"The fundamental task for ensuring peace and stability on the Korean peninsula and in the rest of Asia is to put an end to the hostile relationship between the DPRK (North Korea) and the USA," it said in a report of a joint newspaper editorial on the country''s foreign policy stance.

Pyongyang, Jan 1 - North Korea Friday called for an end to the hostile relationship between Pyongyang and Washington while reiterating it will pursue for a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.

"The fundamental task for ensuring peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and in the rest of Asia is to put an end to the hostile relationship between DPRK (North Korea) and the USA," Pyongyang said in a joint New Year editorial with Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), Xinhua reported.

Islamabad, Dec. 30 : Pakistan has denied reports suggesting that it had transferred nuclear know-how’s to North Korea .

Referring to an article published in The Washington Post on December 28 titled,“Pakistani scientist depicts more advanced nuclear programme in North Korea”, Foreign Office (FO) spokesman, Abdul Basit said the assertions and insinuations made in the story were baseless.

Seoul, Dec 29 - North Korea said Tuesday it had detained a US citizen who illegally crossed the border from China, confirming earlier reports that the activist entered the Stalinist state.

Activists have said that Robert Park, 28, crossed into North Korea Friday, carrying a letter for leader Kim Jong Il asking him to liberate concentration camps and raise awareness of Pyongyang's human rights abuses.

Washington, Dec 28 : Pakistan may helped North Korea find a second way to build nuclear weapons as early as the 1990s, the Washington Post reported Monday citing a previously unpublicised account by the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb.

North Korea constructed a plant to manufacture a gas needed for uranium enrichment and may have been enriching uranium on a small scale by 2002, with "maybe 3,000 or even more" centrifuges, it said citing notorious Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan.

Seoul, Dec 11 - Following a meeting with a US special envoy, North Korea indicated Friday that it was ready to resume mothballed international talks to end its nuclear weapons programme.

Quoting an unidentified foreign ministry spokesperson, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said the meeting produced a "a series of common understandings on the need to resume the six-party talks", which also include South Korea, Russia, Japan and China.

Seoul, Dec 10 - US President Barack Obama's special envoy for North Korea Stephen Bosworth ended his visit to North Korea Thursday.

Bosworth had arrived in the Stalinist state Tuesday tasked with persuading North Korea to restart six-party talks aimed at ending the communist state's nuclear weapons programme. The talks involve South Korea, North Korea, Japan, Russia, the US and China.

Seoul, Dec 8 - US President Barack Obama's special envoy for North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, travelled to the Stalinist state Tuesday to try to convince the country to return to international denuclearisation talks.

Bosworth also hopes to convince the regime in Pyongyang to honour a disarmament deal stuck in 2005 with the US, Russia, China, Japan and South Korea - the other participants in the six-party talks.

Beijing, Nov 19 - China and North Korea will enhance military cooperation to boost peace and stability in the region, officials of both the countries said.

China and North Korea are friends and the two armies maintain close cooperation, said Xu Caihou, vice chairman of China's Central Military Commission.

Xu made the remarks Wednesday during his meeting with Kim Jong Gak, member of North Korea's National Defence Commission.

Seoul - North Korea warned Friday it would use "merciless" military action to defend its sea border with South Korea.

In a statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency, North Korea's military demanded an apology for a naval clash earlier this week in the Yellow Sea and said it would "take merciless military measures" to defend its unilaterally drawn maritime border.

Seoul  - North Korea charged Thursday that a naval skirmish this week with South Korea was a conspiracy by its neighbour aimed at thwarting a current thaw in tensions.

Navy vessels from the two Koreas exchanged fire Tuesday, the first such incident in seven years. According to South Korea's military, a northern vessel crossed the disputed sea border in the Yellow Sea and opened fire after a southern ship fired warning shots.

Pyongyang, however, blamed South Korea for the clash, accusing it of having violated the Northern Limit Line off their west coasts.

Singapore - US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday said a recent clash between warships from North and South Korea would not affect the decision to send a US special envoy to the Stalinist state.

Ambassador Stephen Bosworth would visit Pyongyang "in the near future" to persuade North Korea to return to international talks on ending its nuclear weapons programme, Clinton said on the sidelines of the summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).

Seoul - North and South Korea on Wednesday strengthened the monitoring of their border in the Yellow Sea, a day after engaging in a sea battle there, the South Korean government said.

South Korea's naval forces were put on heightened alert "in preparation for additional provocations by the North," South Korean Navy Chief of Staff Jung Ok Keun said in Seoul, according to the national news agency Yonhap.

A spokesman for the South's Joint Chiefs of Staff said North Korea's navy had also stepped up its watch over the border off the neighbours' west coasts.

London, Nov. 10 : Navies of North and South Korea have exchanged fire in waters off the west coast of the two countries, Sky News reports.

A South Korean warship shot at a navy vessel from the North that crossed the disputed border in the Yellow Sea, a South Korean military officer said.

The North''s ship then shot back, he said.

Another officer said there were no South Korean casualties, although it was unclear whether there were any on the North Korean side.

Washington - US President Barack Obama is to send a top diplomat to North Korea for discussions aimed at resuming international disarmament talks with Pyongyang, the Washington Post reported Tuesday.

The report comes as warships belonging to North and South Korea clashed off their west coast, and shortly before Obama begins a four-nation tour of Asia later this week.

Seoul, Nov 9 : The US and North Korea will hold talks in December, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported Monday citing a senior official here.

"The bilateral meeting appears most likely to be held after the Thanksgiving holiday, which falls Nov 25-29," the official said requesting anonymity.

The US State Department is likely to announce the details of the meeting such as date and venue by Tuesday, the report said.

Washington, Nov. 4 : North Korea''s official news agency Yonhap has reported that the country has finished reprocessing 8,000 spent nuclear fuel rods, which are likely to provide enough plutonium for at least one nuclear weapon.

North Korea has already carried out two nuclear tests, one in 2006, and one in May of this year.

Prior to Tuesday''s announcement, Pyongyang had a stockpile of 30 to 50 kilograms of plutonium, according to the US Congressional Research Service. That is enough for five to eight nuclear devices.