Beijing: The United States and North Korea had their first【L1】______in four

Beijing: The United States and North Korea had their first face-to-face meeting in four months here this afternoon as part of six-nation negotiations on how to end North Korea’s nuclear program, but diplomats played down prospects for an early breakthrough.
    James A. Kelly, assistant Secretary of State, and Kim Yong II, North Korea’s deputy foreign minister, met on the sidelines of formal discussions, breaking a freeze on direct dialogue that began after a stormy meeting in April in which North Korea warned that it was moving quickly to develop and deploy nuclear arms.
    The Bush administration had insisted for months that it would only hold talks with North Korea in a multilateral setting because, it argued, only collective pressure would persuade North Korea to dismantle its nuclear program. It got its way when North Korea dropped its insistence on direct talks and agreed, after extensive efforts by China, to hold unusual simultaneous negotiations with China, Japan, South Korea and Russia as well as the United States.
    Though Bush administration officials had not ruled out talking privately with the North Koreans during a broader meeting, the fact that Mr. Kelly and Mr. Kim met on the first day was seen as a sign of modest flexibility by the American side.