United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Wednesday that the hopes of resuming the six-party talks on the DPRK nuclear issue increased after the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) offered to freeze its nuclear program.  

"The secretary-general feels that there is a growing momentum for the resumption of the six-party talks, thus advancing the Beijing process intended to resolve the nuclear and related issues in the Korean Peninsula," his spokesman Fred Eckhard said in a statement.

"While urging the parties to the talks to intensify their preparations, the secretary-general is encouraged by the recent statement by the DPRK, as well as the response to it by the countries concerned," Eckhard added.

The DPRK announced on Tuesday it would "refrain from test and production of nuclear weapons and stop even operating nuclear power industry for a peaceful purpose as first-phase measures of the package solution" to its row with the United States over the nuclear issue.

Both US Secretary of State Colin Powell and South Korean officials welcomed the DPRK statement, saying it is conducive to the resumption of fresh talks.

China, the DPRK, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the United States held their first round of talks last year in Beijing on Pyongyang's nuclear program. Due to sharp differences between the US and the DPRK, the second round of talks, originally scheduled for last December, was postponed. 

(Xinhua News Agency January 8, 2004)