TOKYO, July 24: An alleged US army deserter in Japan for medical treatment wants to meet a US military adviser to see if he can swap information on North Korea and an admission of guilt for a light sentence.

Charles Robert Jenkins, 64, who is accused of deserting to North Korea in 1965, has conveyed to Japanese authorities that he wants an explanation of plea-bargaining procedures, the Yomiuri Shimbun said.

Neither a foreign ministry spokesman nor a US embassy spokeswoman could confirm the report.

Jenkins has been in a Tokyo hospital since coming to Japan last week with Japanese wife Hitomi Soga, a 45-year-old who was kidnapped by Pyongyang spies, and daughters Mika, 21, and Belinda, 18, after a reunion in Indonesia earlier.

He faces court martial by the US military for desertion to North Korea following his disappearance on South Korea's border with the North nearly 30 years ago, but Japan is unwilling to see him handed over to US authorities.

Washington has offered to delay a request for his handover while he is being treated, saying it has sympathy for his case. Jenkins could be handed over for court martial at a US base in Japan.

Jenkins' case has been closely watched to see how Washington will handle desertion at a time when its troops are still in Iraq.

Tokyo has been eager to resolve the issue of the abduction of its citizens to North Korea in the late 1970s and 80s.

Five of the kidnap victims, including Soga, were allowed to return home in 2002. Five children of two couples were allowed to come to Japan in May.

Jenkins, who married Soga in 1980 in Pyongyang, at first had refused to come to Japan with his daughters, fearing prosecution by the US military, but later relented due to his poor health following stomach surgery in April.

The reunion took place in Indonesia because the country does not have an extradition treaty with the United States. -AFP