S. Korea positive on outcome of U.S.-China summit

South Korea appreciates the outcome of the U.S.-China summit, an official said Thursday, after the high-stakes meeting called for inter-Korean dialogue as an "essential step" in reducing tensions and expressed "concern" about North Korea's uranium enrichment program.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao held a summit in Washington on Wednesday (U.S. time) that touched on a wide range of issues, including heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula over Pyongyang's military provocations and nuclear programs.

The joint statement issued after the meeting said that the two leaders "emphasized importance of an improvement in North-South relations and agreed that sincere and constructive inter-Korean dialogue is an essential step," a stance that is in line with the South's position.

Obama and Hu also "expressed concern regarding the DPRK's claimed uranium enrichment program," according to the statement that referred to the North by the acronym of its official name, Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

China's agreement to voice concern about the uranium program represents a step forward because Beijing has so far been reluctant to even acknowledge the program's existence despite Pyongyang's claims to it.

"It appears things turned out well. We appreciate its outcome," a South Korean foreign ministry official said on condition of anonymity. "What is more important is to follow up on the outcome. We expect that China will play a role as a responsible country in the region."

Washington plans to send an envoy to Seoul "as early as next week" to debrief the Asian ally on the results of the summit, the official said. Either Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg or Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell is expected to come, officials have said.

Tension on the Korean Peninsula spiked in November last year after North Korea shelled the South's border island of Yeonpyeong, killing four people, including two civilians, and revealed that the regime is running a uranium enrichment facility.

Uranium, if highly enriched, can be weapons-grade, giving Pyongyang a second way of building nuclear weapons after its existing program based on plutonium, with which the communist nation conducted two nuclear test explosions in 2006 and 2009.

North Korea has since made an abrupt about-face, stepping up peace overtures and calling for unconditional talks with the South, a move that fits the typical pattern of Pyongyang's behavior of raising tensions with provocations and then calling for dialogue to extract concessions.

In response, South Korea and the U.S. have said that Pyongyang should first improve relations with Seoul by taking responsibility for the island shelling as well as the March sinking of a South Korean warship, and demonstrate its denuclearization commitment through action.

In particular, Seoul and Washington have called for a tougher international response to the North's uranium enrichment program, saying it violates U.N. Security Council resolutions and Pyongyang's own 2005 commitment to give up nuclear programs in exchange for concessions.

China, the last-remaining major ally and main aid provider for the impoverished North, has been considered an impediment to efforts to get the Council to take up the matter. Beijing had remained vague on the program, saying the program must first be verified.

Given such a Chinese position, Wednesday's summit could be considered a success and brighten the prospects of the Council taking up the agenda for punishment of the North.

But the South Korean official cautioned against hasty optimism, saying that expressing concern is one thing and how to deal with it is another.

"We should hear more about how the two sides agreed to deal with it," he said. "In light of the Chinese stance so far, chances of its agreement (to any Council action) are not high."