Media reports said Tuesday that the six-party talks in Beijing had discussed Russia's plan to write off North Korea's debt to the former Soviet Union as a way of aiding the impoverished nation.
"We are discussing the resolution of the debt issue. There can be various terms, but it will definitely be a dramatic reduction of the debt," Sergei Lavrov said onboard a plane from New Delhi to Abu Dhabi.
The latest round of six-party talks in Beijing on Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program ended up in an agreement that Russia, the United States, South Korea and China will provide humanitarian aid to North Korea in return for its nuclear disarmament, a joint statement at the talks said Tuesday.
"We are completing negotiations on Pyongyang's debt to Russia and we think this will help ease North Korea's economic and financial problems," the Russian minister said.
Russia's envoy to the six-nation talks, Alexander Losyukov, denied reports Tuesday that Russia might write off the debt completely. He said the two countries would hold a meeting of an intergovernmental commission on the issue in March.
