U.S. Relations with the People's Republic of China (2006)

U.S. Department of State

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Roundtable with the Travel Pool

Secretary Condoleezza Rice
Dead Sea, Jordan
November 30, 2006

[ ...Intervening Text... ]

QUESTION: North Korea. Two days of talks didn't result in an agreement, do you anticipate more discussions on that. And were you able to get any agreement from the North Koreans that they would meet again? Anything on a date?

SECRETARY RICE: We didn't. But what we are doing is preparing the talks and so if it takes some time to prepare the talks, that's worth doing. The North Koreans have said they'll come back to the talks. That's a done deal. But we don't want to just have people come back to the talks. We want to have -- come back to talks that have some possibility of having an outcome and that's what these discussions are about. And it's not really -- I wouldn't think of it as having to come to an agreement.

I think that what we're trying to do is to get a sense of what the expectations are of parties when they come back to the talks. So it's not a -- an agreement, but then we walk into the six-party talks and now -- it really is what are the expectations of this next round and that may take some time. And it may take further discussions.

I might just note that it's not the United States and North Korea; it's the United States, China, North Korea. The Russians have been having conversations with the North Koreans and others have, too.

[ ...Intervening Text... ]