BEIJING

Arms negotiators yesterday failed to set a firm deadline for North Korea to disable its nuclear facilities following the shutdown of its reactor.

The only agreement was to hold more consultations on Pyongyang's disarmament.

Chinese envoy Wu Dawei said working groups would meet before the end of August to discuss technical details for the North's next steps.

Those sessions would be followed by a resumption of talks involving envoys from all six countries in early September to "work out the roadmap".

At the latest round, the North "reiterated that it will earnestly implement its commitments to a complete declaration of all nuclear programmes and disablement of all existing nuclear facilities," Wu said.

The statement, after three days of talks in Beijing, failed to include any deadline for the North to proceed with those steps, as the US had sought at the start of the talks.

The US had insisted earlier that North Korea could still disable its nuclear facilities by the end of the year, a deadline it had hoped would be put in writing this week.

"Ultimately, we decided not to put in deadlines - yet," US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said. "We'll put in deadlines when we have the working groups and we know precisely what we're talking about."

White House spokesman Tony Snow said in Washington: "There will be continued diplomacy. The North Koreans understand that they need to finish the job not only of shutting down the Yongbyon reactor, but also making sure that they put an end to the reprocessing or enrichment of uranium or other fissile materials." - AP