SEOUL, Nov 12: South Korea decided to shy away from a US-led international initiative to stop and inspect suspicious cargo, to avoid possible clashes with North Korea, a top politician said on Sunday.

The decision was reached on Saturday at a joint meeting of top officials of the government and the ruling Uri Party, said Kim Won-Wung, a Uri Party lawmaker who chairs parliament's unification, foreign affairs and trade committee.

South Korea, a close US ally, was under growing pressure to expand its roles in Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) drills, following the communist country's Oct 9 nuclear test.

North Korea Nov 1 confirmed it would return to six-party talks aimed at ending its nuclear weapons programmes, on condition the issue of lifting US financial sanctions imposed against it was settled during the negotiations.

“We have reached a conclusion that we support the spirit of PSI, but we should confine ourselves to our current roles in the drills,” Kim Won-Wung said.

“Now that Pyongyang has decided to return to six-party talks, we don't have to take a step that wouldn't be helpful for creating an atmosphere for dialogue,” he said.

The North denounced South Korea for sending a government delegation of three observers to PSI drills off Bahrain late last month, arguing the drills “constitute part of the sanctions, blockade and military pressure”.

Officials in Seoul said South Korea's active participation in the PSI exercises could lead to armed clashes with North Korea, with which the South has been technically at war since a bloody 1950-1953 conflict.—AFP