BEIJING - South Korean President Lee Myung-bak on Wednesday described international talks as the necessary means to coax North Korea's denuclearization, opening a narrow window for resuming long-dormant negotiations, The Washington Post reports.

Though numerous obstacles stand in the way of renewed aid-for-disarmament talks, Lee's comment - coming after weeks of more hawkish rhetoric - suggests that South Korea won't rely solely on military muscle to pressure its neighbor.

Lee used urgent terms to describe the need to resume negotiations, calling on North Korea to abandon its nuclear program within a year.

South Korea has "no choice but to resolve the problem of dismantling North Korea's nuclear program diplomatically through the six-party talks," Lee was quoted as saying by Seoul's Yonhap news agency.

Since Pyongyang's Nov. 23 shelling of a South Korean island, participants in the stalled talks - China, Russia and North Korea; South Korea, Japan and the United States - have been split along Cold War lines, with Beijing in particular calling for the talks' emergency resumption.

Officials in Seoul, Tokyo and Washington have given little credence to that plan, refusing to return to the negotiating table until Pyongyang acknowledges its denuclearization promises.


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