Japan, China, SKorea take up NKorea at rare joint talks

TOKYO (AFP) - Japan called Saturday for cooperation on ending North Korea's nuclear drive as its foreign minister held rare joint talks with regional powers China and South Korea.

Japanese Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura, China's Yang Jiechi and Yu Myung-Hwan of South Korea held only the second-ever three-way meeting among the countries, whose relations have sometimes been uneasy.

The talks came a day after a surprise thaw in relations between Japan and North Korea, which agreed to start a new probe into an emotive row over the kidnappings of Japanese civilians.

Japan, which has taken the hardest line internationally against North Korea, in turn agreed to ease some sanctions on Pyongyang in a boost for a slow-moving six-nation deal on disarming North Korea.

North Korea missed a deadline to declare all of its nuclear programmes by the end of last year as part of the agreement, which was signed by the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States.