SEOUL, Jan 25: South Korea has urged the United Nations to give diplomacy a chance in the North Korean nuclear crisis by delaying an emergency meeting of its atomic watchdog to allow Seoul’s special envoy time to talk to isolated Pyongyang.

South Korea has requested a postponement of the meeting of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) set for Feb 3 to discuss North Korea’s decision this month to withdraw from a global treaty to prevent the spread of atomic arms, the foreign ministry said on Saturday.

“We delivered our hope that any IAEA meeting would be held at a later date to better reflect the outcome of talks by our envoy to the North,” said Cheon Young-woo, a director at the Foreign Ministry. “We expect a positive response from the IAEA board members.”

South Korean outgoing President Kim Dae-jung is to send a special envoy to North Korea on Monday to discuss the crisis.

Officials say time is running out for Pyongyang to resolve the crisis and the emergency IAEA meeting could set the stage for moving the issue to the U.N. Security Council, which has the power to impose sanctions on the communist North.

Pyongyang has said U.N. sanctions would be a declaration of war.

South Korea moved to defuse the crisis by announcing it would send a special envoy to the North on Monday, just hours after the two sides agreed to work for a peaceful solution.

President-elect Roh Moo-hyun issued his own overture, saying he planned to propose a summit with North Korea’s reclusive leader, Kim Jong-il.

FACING REALITY: Roh’s envoy, Chung Dong-young, told the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, on Friday that time was running out.