The foreign ministers of South Korea, the U.S. and Japan plan to hold talks next week to discuss North Korea’s nuclear programs and cooperation on regional issues, Seoul officials said Friday.

South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida will meet on the sidelines of the ASEAN Regional Forum on Monday in Brunei.

The three-way consultation is the first since each took office this year. Their predecessors met together twice last year while attending the ARF and the U.N. General Assembly.

The region’s largest security conference brings together top diplomats from Seoul, Washington, Beijing and other key players. North Korean Foreign Minister Pak Ui-chun is also expected to participate.

“The ministers will meet at a time when the three countries’ cooperation on the North Korea problem is becoming critical,” a Foreign Ministry official told reporters on condition of anonymity, citing the South Korea-China summit and North Korea’s intensifying peace offensive.

“Despite time constraints, the talks could have significance in setting the direction for future trilateral collaboration on the issue, based on the South Korea-China summit and the U.S.-China summit.”

The meeting comes after Pyongyang recently offered talks with Seoul and Washington.

But the allies’ chief nuclear envoys gathered in Washington last week and agreed on the need for stronger obligations on Pyongyang than those stipulated in its Feb. 29, 2012, agreement with Washington before any restart of dialogue.

During their first summit on Wednesday, President Park Geun-hye and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping agreed that the denuclearization of the peninsula is in their common interest.

Xi and U.S. President Barack Obama also vowed not to accept the North as a nuclear-armed state at a meeting earlier this month in California.

For Yun, the three-way dialogue could also mean a chance to foster rapport with Kishida and search for ways to mend bilateral ties frayed by historical and territorial rows.

In April the top Korean diplomat scrapped his envisioned first trip to Tokyo in protest against some Japanese Cabinet ministers’ visit to the Yasukuni Shrine that honors top World War II criminals.

Meanwhile, Yun has already traveled to Washington and Beijing twice and had talks with Kerry and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, respectively. He is also expected to separately meet with Yi in Brunei next week.

With the Shinzo Abe government poised for a sweeping victory for the July upper house election, the U.S. is concerned that Japan’s rightward swing may deepen a rift with South Korea and China and thus dent pivotal coordination between the members of the six-party talks aimed at denuclearizing the North.

“Basically the core of the U.S.’ Asia strategy lies in its bilateral alliances and trilateral cooperation with South Korea and Japan so that the three countries have a shared recognition of the importance of the three-way talks,” the Foreign Ministry official added.

“But the U.S. also fully recognizes that they are unable to strengthen the trilateral partnership a little more because of the recent mood in Seoul-Tokyo relations.” 

By Shin Hyon-hee
(heeshin@heraldcorp.com)