• 
• 

"There's no place for North Korea to go. They have no friends left to protect them from the international community's efforts to move toward denuclearisation," Clinton told a press conference.

North Korea was a hot issue at the Asean Regional Forum (ARF), Southeast Asia's most important security forum, as diplomats from Pyongyang told the meeting the country would never halt its nuclear programme or ballistic-missile development.

Ri Hung-sik, North Korea's director for international-organisation affairs, rushed to see reporters in the middle of the ARF meeting to deliver the message of refusal.

"We cannot talk to a person with a knife in his pocket," Ri told reporters in Korean.

Initially, Ri booked the podium to hold a press conference back to back with Clinton, but the US delegation had reserved a large space, and Clinton met the media late.

Li decided to take over a corner of the conference room to deliver his country's message.

Fearing harsh criticism at the Asean meeting, Pyongyang has sent only low-ranking diplomats led by Ambassador-at-Large Pak Kun-gwang to Phuket.Prior to the meeting, Clinton announced a comprehensive package with economic incentives to normalise relations with North Korea if the country stopped its nuclear programme.

North Korea's Ri called the package "nonsense" and said it was merely a replay of the George W Bush administration's "Complete, Verifiable, Irreversible Dismantlement" policy.

"The US is telling us to take off all of our clothes," he said. "The most important thing for us is sovereignty. Sovereignty, security, namely life, should be guaranteed. How can we barter life with money?"Clinton said the international community would use UN Resolution No 1874 to deal with North Korea.

More than a simple condemnation, that resolution, combined with authorisations from the UN Sanctions Committee, is a powerful tool for addressing North Korea's unacceptable activities.

It puts pressure on individuals and entities connected to the regime and its nuclear, ballistic-missile and related programmes, she said.

UN Resolution No 1874 was adopted unanimously on June 12 after North Korea conducted an underground nuclear test on May 25. It imposes further economic and commercial sanctions against that country and encourages UN member states to search North Korean cargo.

The international community will act unanimously to enforce the resolution, she said, pointing out that even Burma, which has military ties with North Korea, signed the resolution. North Korea's nuclear ambitions are elevating tensions on the Korean Peninsula and could provoke an arms race in the region.

"That would serve no one's national interest," she said

North Korea has no option but to return to denuclearisation talks and fulfil its commitments under a 2005 joint statement calling on it to abandon its nuclear-weapons programme and return at an early date to six-party non-proliferation talks and International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards, she said.

The six-party talks consist of US, China, Russia, Japan and North and South Korea.