North Korea invites U.S. envoy to discuss nuclear talks

North Korea has invited the U.S. envoy overseeing relations with the reclusive state to visit for nuclear talks next month, South Korean media said on Tuesday, the latest in a recent series of conciliatory gestures.

U.S. envoy Stephen Bosworth would lead a delegation first traveling to South Korea, China and Japan to discuss stalled six-way disarmament-for-aid talks with the North before heading to Pyongyang. It would mark the first official nuclear talks between North Korea and the Obama administration.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted a diplomatic source in Washington as saying the North extended the invitation when former President Bill Clinton visited Pyongyang this month.

U.S. officials have said separately they are willing to hold direct talks with North Korea but only as part of six-country disarmament negotiations involving the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States.

[Reuters]