Enlarge imageBy Linda Sieg and Jack Kim
KYOTO, Japan (Reuters) - North Korea’s nuclear threat and Myanmar’s human rights record overhung a meeting of Asian and European foreign ministers on Friday, while Japan’s war past was likely to set the tone for its talks with China and South Korea.
South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon and Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, who met on the sidelines of an Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) in the Japanese city of Kyoto, urged North Korea not to do anything that would further isolate it at a time of concerns about a possible nuclear test by Pyongyang.
"The ministers said any moves by North Korea that deteriorate the situation further would not help and only further isolate itself," South Korean official Park Joon-woo said.
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Recent media reports have said that Pyongyang may be preparing to escalate the crisis by conducting a nuclear test.
On Sunday, North Korea test-fired a short-range missile into the Sea of Japan, fuelling concern that it may be trying to merge its missile programmes with nuclear weapons.
The ministers also expressed concern about a verbal slanging match between Pyongyang and Washington, Park said.
U.S. President George W. Bush said in late April that North Korean leader Kim Jong-il was "a dangerous person" and "a tyrant" who starved his people. North Korea then called Bush "a half-baked man in terms of morality" and "a philistine."
Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura is likely to use his meeting with Li on Saturday to urge Beijing -- the secretive Stalinist state’s main backer -- to try harder to bring Pyongyang back to six-country talks aimed at ending its nuclear ambitions.
Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao expressed concern on Thursday about North Korea and vowed support for the talks.
The United States has made clear it would consider taking the matter to the U.N. Security Council, where North Korea could face sanctions, if Pyongyang refused to resume the six-way talks.
The two Koreas, the United States, Japan, Russia and China last met to discuss the issue in June 2004.
In February, North Korea announced it had nuclear weapons, and U.S. officials say they believe Pyongyang has already amassed enough fissile material to make six to eight bombs.
MYANMAR, AND JAPAN’S HISTORY
The formal agenda at the two-day ASEM gathering covers topics ranging from the crisis on the Korean peninsula to U.N. reform in 38 countries accounting for 60 percent of world trade.
EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner was set for talks with Myanmar’s foreign minister, Nyan Win, to raise concerns about the Southeast Asian military junta’s human rights record and detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Those concerns prompted the EU to step up sanctions against Myanmar, formally known as Burma, last year, but Brussels has recently shifted its policy and is seeking dialogue.
"We want to see a release of Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, an inclusive national convention and a return to dialogue on human rights," said Emma Udwin, a spokeswoman for Ferrero-Waldner.
About 60 supporters of Suu Kyi gathered in the rain along the road to the Kyoto International Conference Hall where Friday’s meeting was being held, carrying placards and shouting slogans against the military junta.
"Peace and Freedom for Burma," read one sign.
CHINA ARMS EMBARGO
Japan is likely to raise its concerns about the EU’s proposed lifting of its arms ban on China, which in turn plans to use the ASEM gathering to lobby for the lifting of the embargo.
The EU imposed a ban on most arms sales following the suppression of pro-democracy protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, but most EU leaders now consider it an anachronism and an impediment to better relations with an emerging Asian giant.
Tokyo, like Washington, is opposed to ending the ban.
Machimura was set to meet South Korea’s Ban on Friday for talks at which Japan’s wartime history and a dispute over two tiny islets were likely to come up.
Like Beijing, Seoul was outraged by Tokyo’s approval of textbooks that critics say whitewash Japan’s wartime atrocities.
Japan and South Korea are also at odds over two rocky South Korean-held islands.
Seoul regards Tokyo’s claims to the islands, known as Takeshima in Japan and Tokto in South Korea, as an attempt to justify Japan’s brutal 1910-1945 rule of the Korean Peninsula.
Machimura’s talks with China’s Li will follow Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s meeting with Chinese President Hu in Jakarta last month, which pulled ties between the two Asian giants back from the brink but left underlying rivalry unresolved.
