Beijing: Ending days of speculation, China today (Apr 21, 2004) said the reclusive North Korean leader, Kim Jong Il, was in Beijing and held talks with the entire top Chinese leadership and reached "wide-ranging consensus" on key matters, including the nuclear issue.

"Kim Jong Il, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea and Chairman of the National Defence Commission of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea), paid an unofficial visit to China from April 19 to 21, a spokesman with the international department of the ruling Communist Party of China said.

Kim visited China at the invitation of President Hu Jintao, who is also General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), he said.

Yesterday (Apr 20), the Chinese foreign ministry had declined to confirm Kim's visit. Kim apparently travelled to Beijing on a special train.

During the visit, Hu held talks with Kim and hosted a welcoming banquet. Chairman of China's Central Military Commission, Jiang Zemin, Chairman of the Chinese Parliament, Wu Bangguo and Premier Wen Jiabao, Vice President, Zeng Qinghong and the chairman of the top advisory body, Jia Qinglin also met with Kim separately.

"Leaders of the two parties and the two countries, amid a cordial, friendly and candid atmosphere, briefed each other on their respective domestic conditions, and exchanged views and reached wide-ranging consensus on further developing the relations between the two parties and the two countries, international and regional situations and the nuclear issue of the Korean peninsula," the official Xinhua news agency reported.