Ex-U.S. Pres. Clinton meets N. Korea leader Kim Jong Il: reports+

PYONGYANG/BEIJING, Aug. 4 Kyodo -
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il met
Tuesday in Pyongyang, North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency
reported.

''Kim Jong Il, general secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea and chairman of
the National Defence Commission of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea,
today met with former U.S. President Bill Clinton and his party on a visit to
the DPRK. Bill Clinton courteously conveyed a verbal message of U.S. President
Barack Obama to Kim Jong Il,'' KCNA said.
It added Kim expressed thanks for the message and ''welcomed Clinton's visit to
the DPRK and had an exhaustive conversation with him.''
''There was a wide-ranging exchange of views on the matters of common
concern,'' the report continued, adding North Korean First Vice Minister of
Foreign Affairs Kang Sok Ju and Department Director of the WPK Central
Committee Kim Yang Gon also attended the meeting.
But in Washington on Tuesday, White House White House spokesman Robert Gibbs
denied that Clinton conveyed a message from Obama to Kim.
''That's not true,'' Gibbs told reporters when asked to comment on the KCNA
report.
Earlier, Gibbs had issued a terse statement saying, ''While this solely private
mission to secure the release of two Americans is on the ground, we will have
no comment. We do not want to jeopardize the success of former President
Clinton's mission.''
''We will have more to say on this, hopefully, later on,'' he added.
KCNA reported Kim hosted a dinner for Clinton at the state guest house on
Tuesday evening in Pyongyang.
Clinton arrived in Pyongyang on Tuesday on a surprise visit apparently aimed at
negotiating the release of two U.S. journalists detained in North Korea.
The move is seen as possibly leading to a break in the impasse over North
Korea's nuclear ambitions.
It is unclear how long Clinton will stay in Pyongyang, but the trip could mark
the start of bilateral negotiations to address rising tensions in East Asia
sparked by the North's nuclear and missile tests in defiance of the U.N.
Security Council.
Upon arrival at Pyongyang's international airport, Clinton was greeted by Yang
Hyong Sop, vice president of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly,
North Korea's parliament, and Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye Gwan.
A young girl presented Clinton with flowers.
Clinton flew to Pyongyang on a chartered flight and his party does not include
U.S. government officials, according to South Korea's Chosun Ilbo, quoting an
unidentified diplomatic source.
Clinton, whose wife is U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, is the first
former U.S. president to visit North Korea since Jimmy Carter in June 1994.
During that visit, which was meant to help resolve the nuclear crisis at the
time, Carter held talks with the now-deceased Kim Il Sung, then leader and
father of current leader Kim.
Yonhap News Agency quoted North Korean watchers in Seoul and Washington as
saying Clinton is expected to bring home Laura Ling and Euna Lee, whom North
Korea's top court sentenced in June to 12 years of labor for illegally crossing
the border from China and committing a ''grave crime'' against the country.
''I believe it suggests the likelihood that the DPRK has signaled in advance
that he will come back with the two journalists,'' Scott Snyder, director of
the Center for U.S.-Korea Policy at the Asia Foundation in Washington, was
quoted as saying, referring to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the
country's official name.
''To come back without the journalists would constitute a major loss of face
for Clinton,'' Snyder said.
The United States has said that the case of the two U.S. journalists is a
humanitarian issue and should be treated separately from the current standoff
over North Korea's nuclear ambitions.
North Korea appears poised to take advantage of Clinton's visit to launch
bilateral negotiations with the United States, rather than using the six-party
talks on denuclearizing Pyongyang.
Washington and Pyongyang have no diplomatic relations.
Experts said they are not yet sure whether Clinton's visit will lead to a
breakthrough in stalled nuclear negotiations.
''If North Korea is not prepared to negotiate denuclearization and the U.S. is
not prepared to accept North Korea as a nuclear weapon state, the relationship
will remain at an impasse,'' Denny Roy, senior fellow at the East-West Center
in Honolulu, was quoted by Yonhap as saying.
Hillary Clinton said last month that her government will offer a
''comprehensive package'' of incentives for Pyongyang, including the
normalization of diplomatic ties, if the country takes irreversible steps
towards denuclearization.
Ling and Lee were captured by North Korean guards along the Tumen River border
with China on March 17 while they were working on a story for former U.S. Vice
President Al Gore's Current TV network.
On July 27, North Korea indicated it would seek bilateral dialogue with the
United States, while repeating its refusal to return to the table of the
six-party talks with China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the United States.
North Korea quit the six-party talks in April to protest a U.N. Security
Council statement denouncing its rocket launch, which was widely seen as a
disguised missile test.
In mid-July, a U.N. sanctions committee slapped a new set of sanctions on North
Korea based on Resolution 1874, which the Security Council adopted June 12 in
response to Pyongyang's second nuclear test May 25.
==Kyodo