S Korea, US discuss N Korean human rights

A US special envoy met with South Korea's chief nuclear negotiator on Monday and discussed ways to promote human rights conditions in North Korea, officials were reported by the South Korean Yonhap news agency as saying. Ambassador Robert King, the US special envoy for North Korean human rights, held talks earlier in the day with Lim Sung-nam, South Korea's top negotiator to the six-party talks aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program. After talks with Lim, King told reporters that, "It's important that we continue talking about our efforts to promote human rights in North Korea." King arrived in Seoul on Saturday for a five-day visit as part of his Asian "field trips" aimed at assessing the latest human rights situation in North Korea, Seoul officials said. King and Seoul officials also exchanged views on the North's new leader Kim Jong-un, who took the helm of the communist state in December 2011 after the death of his father, they said. But the topic of humanitarian aid to North Korea has been taken off the table during meetings between King and Seoul officials, they said.