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BEIJING : A senior Chinese Communist Party official was on Saturday heading for North Korea, as the international community tries to persuade Pyongyang to return to nuclear disarmament talks, state media said.
Wang Jiarui, head of the party's international department, was on a "goodwill visit" at the invitation of the Workers' Party of Korea, Xinhua news agency reported.
South Korean media said he was expected to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il and give him a message from President Hu Jintao to help the resumption of the six-party nuclear talks China has hosted since 2003.
The Chinese Communist Party's international department could not be contacted Saturday.
Sanctions-hit North Korea wants Washington to agree to formal peace talks as a condition for returning to the stalled nuclear disarmament negotiations, which include South Korea, China, Japan, the United States and Russia.
Pyongyang withdrew from the talks in April after the UN slapped harsher sanctions on the North following its missile and nuclear tests.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon's top political adviser, Lynn Pascoe, arrived in Seoul Saturday for talks on North Korea's nuclear programme ahead of a visit to Pyongyang, the South Korean foreign ministry said.
Pascoe, the UN under secretary general for political affairs, is scheduled to visit the North Korean capital from February 9 to 12 as part of a four-nation tour also including China and Japan, Ban's press office said.
- AFP/vm
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