Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi will lobby to insert a pledge in the chairman's statement at the upcoming Asia-Europe Meeting to help deepen North Korea's involvement with the international community, Japanese officials said Sunday.
European and Asian leaders attending the three-day fourth ASEM summit starting later Sunday in the Danish capital Copenhagen are expected to talk at length about Koizumi's landmark visit to North Korea and the upcoming talks on normalizing relations between Tokyo and Pyongyang.
The officials said Koizumi intends to take the lead in such discussions using the diplomatic coup he pulled off having met North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.
One of Koizumi's achievements was North Korea's first-ever admission to abducting Japanese people in the 1970s and 1980s, followed by apologies for committing the abductions. The North also agreed to comply with all international agreements on nuclear issues on the Korean Peninsula as well as to extend its freeze on missile tests beyond 2003.