New talks, following a first, inconclusive round last August, "would be desirable in February", Interfax news agency quoted Losyukov as telling his Japanese counterpart Hitoshi Tanaka.

Tanaka arrived in Moscow on Sunday for three days of informal consultations with Russian officials on bilateral relations and on regional and international issues.

Russian and Japanese officials "exchanged views on ways of resolving the situation on the Korean Peninsula and expressed support for continuing the negotiating process and holding a second round of six-nation talks", Loskykov said.

Russia and Japan, along with the United States, China, South Korea and North Korea, held a first round of talks on defusing the crisis over Pyongyang's development of nuclear weapons in August and are currently engaged in bilateral and trilateral consultations to prepare a second round of talks in the near future.

Efforts to hold a new round last month unravelled amid differences over the scope of the negotiations.

Losyukov said Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi would visit Moscow in the first half of 2004, with Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov likely to make a return visit to Tokyo in the second half of the year, ITAR-TASS news agency reported.

Japanese embassy officials said on Sunday Tanaka's visit to Moscow was designed primarily to map out a programme of Russian-Japanese contacts over the coming year.

Although Russia and Japan have failed to sign a formal post-World War II peace treaty because of a dispute over four islands seized by Red Army troops in 1945, the two countries have gradually improved their relations in recent years and are seeking ways to develop economic relations.

Tokyo's Shimbun daily last week said the Japanese government was considering a visit by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to the disputed Kuril islands.

Other media reports said Japan's foreign ministry was planning to hold director-general level talks with Russia on the Kurils and on a peace treaty.

Japan hopes to foster momentum to conclude a peace treaty with Moscow after Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov agreed with Koizumi last month to accelerate the pace of negotiations, Kyodo News cited ministry sources as saying.

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