The five nations, involved in talks with North Korea over its nuclear program, support the ongoing sanctions against the communist state, a U.S. diplomat has said.
Stephen Bosworth, the U.S. special envoy to North Korea, visited the country last week. During the talks, the sides agreed in principle to hold four-way discussions involving South Korea and China on a peace treaty.
"Let me stress again that in my swing through the region, from Seoul to Beijing to Tokyo to Moscow, I found very strong agreement that the unity of the five is very important in trying to deal with North Korea," Bosworth told journalists on Wednesday.
"And I found that there is strong support for continuing to enforce the sanctions, and there was also a strong view that it had been useful for the United States to take on this direct contact with the North Koreans in the context of the Six-Party framework," he went on.
On the six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear issue, involving Russia, the two Koreas, China, Japan and the U.S., he reiterated it remains uncertain when they can be resumed.
State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told journalists on Wednesday that during his visit Bosworth handed a letter from U.S. President Barack Obama for North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il.
"I can only confirm there was such a letter, but I cannot discuss the content or the tone," Kelly said.
"However, I think one can feel very confident it concerned what our very simple agenda was for the visit of Ambassador Bosworth and that was to get North Korea to come back to the six-party talks," the official went on.
The six-party talks came to a halt in April when Pyongyang pulled out of the negotiations in protest against the United Nations' condemnation of its missile tests.
WASHINGTON, December 17 (RIA Novosti)
