Outgoing top US nuclear envoy Christopher Hill on Sunday said North Korean disarmament talks had been "pretty tough" amid continuing deadlock in the drive to end Pyongyang's atomic drive.
The negotiations, which began in 2003, have been mired in countless setbacks, and did not prevent the communist state from testing its first atomic bomb in 2006.
"We've had too many interruptions," Hill told journalists after farewell talks with his South Korean counterpart Kim Sook here. "It's been a pretty tough assignment."
Among the snags that hit the six-party talks — which group the two Koreas, China, Russia, the United States and Japan — was a US-North Korean dispute over allegations that the North illegally laundered money through a Macau-based bank.
The talks led to a 2007 deal that offers the North energy aid, normalised ties with Washington and Tokyo and a permanent peace pact if it dismantles its atomic plants and hands over all of its nuclear weapons and material.
But the disarmament talks are stalled by disagreements over how the North's declared nuclear activities should be verified.
Hill restated the policy of the United States, which does not treat North Korea as a nuclear power and rejects direct disarmament talks with the communist state.
"We do not and have never accepted North Korea as a nuclear weapons state. I want to make that very clear," said Hill, who has served as top US negotiator to the talks since 2005.
Washington has yet to officially announce who will replace Hill, but he confirmed he was preparing to leave his position.
"It is my last visit here as head… of the US delegations of six-party talks," Hill said. "There will be some very competent people who will follow me. I hope we can make some progress."
Hill declined to comment on news reports that he would be named as new US ambassador to Iraq.
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