N.Korea nuclear talks to survive Syria charge - Seoul

SEOUL (Reuters) - U.S. charges that North Korea helped Syria build a nuclear reactor are not expected to derail international talks aimed at ending the communist state's own nuclear arms programme, a South Korean official said on Friday.

The United States on Thursday released photographs it said linked North Korea to a plutonium-producing reactor under construction in Syria in an effort to put pressure on Pyongyang to come clean about proliferating nuclear technology.

"There probably won't be much of a meaningful impact on the six-party talks," said a South Korean official familiar with the multinational negotiations.

Japan, however, said the charges were serious, if true.

"Of course, if North Korea was helping Syria's secret... nuclear activities, then this is a serious issue. I think it is important that this be made clear through the Six-Party Talks' correct and full declaration process," Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said.

Under the deal North Korea struck with five regional powers, it had until the end of 2007 to give a complete list of its fissile material and nuclear weaponry as well as answer U.S. suspicions of enriching uranium for arms and proliferating technology.

A U.S. envoy was in Pyongyang this week to advance the sputtering nuclear talks that have hit a snag over the declaration issue.

If North Korea, which tested a nuclear device in Oct. 2006 with plutonium produced at its Soviet-era reactor, makes the declaration, the United States will remove it from a terrorism blacklist and allow Pyongyang to tap into international finance.

Asked if the latest U.S. claims would an impact on the question of North's removal from Washington's list of nations that sponsor terrorism, Japan's Machimura said: "I don't think this would have a positive influence on North Korea."