Tokyo: Japan said today (Feb 6, 2007) it would refuse to fund any deal on ending North Korea s nuclear ambitions without clear progress in a bilateral row over the communist state s abductions.

Foreign Minister Taro Aso issued the warning ahead of a meeting with US nuclear envoy Christopher Hill, who is in Tokyo to prepare for six-way nuclear talks on North Korea opening Thursday in Beijing.

A weekend Japanese press report said that North Korea had demanded that the United States provide oil shipments in exchange for shutting a nuclear reactor.

Such an arrangement would be in line with a collapsed 1994 accord with North Korea, which was bankrolled by Japan and South Korea.

Aso told reporters Japan would not automatically foot the bill if a new agreement was reached.

"We have no intention to provide our share offhand, even if they decide how much each has to provide in energy, food and money, because we have other issues which remain to be solved," Aso said.

Referring to the abduction row, Aso said, "As long as there is no concrete progress, we cannot respond to such appeals" for assistance.

Japan has refused to establish relations with North Korea, largely over a row over the fate of Japanese civilians kidnapped by the regime s spies in the 1970s and 1980s.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe rose to public prominence advocating a tough line on North Korea over the kidnapping row, which rouses deep emotion in Japan.

The Asahi Shimbun reported Sunday that North Korea had told US officials it wanted 500,000 tons of oil a year in exchange for shutting down its Yongbyon nuclear reactor.
Hill has declined to confirm the report, but noted that economic incentives were part of a September 2005 agreement reached at the six-way talks.

In the 2005 deal, North Korea agreed in principle to give up its nuclear ambitions in exchange for aid and security guarantees.

But Pyongyang walked out of the talks two months afterwards in protest at a series of financial sanctions. It returned to the table more than a year later after testing its first atom bomb.