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The reclusive state has launched a flurry of diplomatic activity toward the United States, China, South Korea and the United Nations, all of which are pressing Pyongyang to return to the nuclear disarmament negotiating table.
But the North remains reluctant to make a much-anticipated promise to rejoin the six-nation nuclear talks, apparently in hopes of extracting bigger concessions at a time when the destitute country is facing a serious economic backlash following its currency revaluation late last year.
Pyongyang invited a senior Chinese official to visit the North this week, which raised hopes that it may use the diplomatic occasion to announce its decision to return to the long-stalled nuclear talks, a move that will score a diplomatic point for Beijing.
China has made diplomatic efforts to resolve the nuclear standoff as the host of the six-party talks since 2003, but has been embarrassed by the North's boycott since April 2008.
The North's promise to return to the nuclear talks could lead to massive aid from China, Pyongyang's only remaining communist ally, which has provided between 70 and 90 percent of North Korea's oil and more than one-third of its food.
Betraying this expectation, however, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il made no such promise when he met Wang Jiarui, head of the liaison office of China's ruling Communist Party, who made a four-day visit to its neighbor to kick start the nuclear talks.
At the meeting in the eastern port city of Hamhung, some 200 kilometers from Pyongyang, Kim just reiterated his country's "persistent stance to realize the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula," according to China's Xinhua news agency on Tuesday. Xinhua also said Chinese President Hu Jintao extended an invitation to the North's leader to visit Beijing.
The North's official Korean Central News Agency made a short report on the meeting, saying Wang conveyed to Kim "a verbal personal message" from Hu. It did not elaborate on its content.
The meeting was not attended by the North's First Vice Foreign Minister Kang Sok Ju, the North's top nuclear policymaker. "The meeting, held outside of Pyongyang without Kang, indicates the nuclear issue was not among the agenda items," said an official at the Foreign Ministry in Seoul.
But Kim sent his top nuclear envoy Kim Kye Gwan to Beijing along with Wang on Tuesday, indicating the two counties would discuss the six-way talks. Media reports said Kim's China trip may be followed by a visit to the United States, as he is accompanied by an English-language interpreter.
According to diplomatic sources in Seoul, North Korea and the United States have had a series of behind-the-scenes contacts to revive negotiations on the nuclear standoff and normalization of diplomatic ties between the two countries.
"The North is dragging its feet to win more concessions, but the two sides are likely to reach a deal sooner or later," the source said.
North Korea has also reached out to its archrival South Korea to resume suspended cross-border tour programs, which have been a much-needed source of cash for the impoverished country.
Monday's border talks ended without an agreement, but the North proposed to meet again to discuss restarting tour programs to the North's scenic Mount Kumgang and ancient capital city of Kaesong.
Pyongyang earned US$538 million in cash from the joint tour program to Mount Kumgang until it was suspended since July 2008. South Korea is also running an industrial complex in the North's Kaesong city, providing cash as wages for more than 38,000 North Korean workers.
Kim Yong-hyun, a professor at Dongguk University in Seoul, said the North's recent military threats and strong verbal attacks on the South are largely aimed at putting pressure on Seoul to resume economic aid and cross-border projects.
The North's military fired hundreds of artillery shells near the inter-Korean maritime border over three days late last month, threatening to stage "a sacred nationwide retaliatory battle to blow up the stronghold of the South Korean authorities."
Again on Monday, the North's highest security organs in the North issued a rare joint statement warning of "all-out strong measures" against South Korean authorities.
"We have a world-level ultra-modern striking force and means for protecting security which have neither yet been mentioned nor opened to the public in total," said the statement issued by the Ministry of People's Security and the Ministry of State Security.
"The warning is designed to press the South to soften its stance toward the North if Seoul wants peace and stability," Kim said.
North Koreans are also expected to use their meeting with a U.N. envoy to call for the lifting of international sanctions imposed to punish it for its nuclear test last May.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's special envoy Lynn Pascoe flew into Pyongyang on Tuesday for a four-day trip in the U.N.'s first bilateral talks with the North since 2004. The nuclear dispute is expected to be on the agenda for his discussions with the North Koreans.
