A resolution adopted by consensus at a general conference in Vienna of the 137-nation watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency "calls upon" North Korea "to promptly accept comprehensive IAEA safeguards and co-operate with the agency in their full and effective implementation."

North Korea, which claims it has nuclear weapons, withdrew in January 2003 from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which sets the safeguards the IAEA is meant to enforce.

Chang-Beom Cho, South Korea's ambassador to the IAEA, told the conference that this year's resolution "delivers a clear message" to North Korea to "make a fundamental strategic decision (that) it should return to the nuclear non-proliferation regime and should accept comprehensive IAEA safeguards without further delay."

He said North Korea "must give up all its nuclear weapons and related programs including its uranium enrichment program in a thorough and transparent manner ... so that this issue does not arise again in the future."

But China expressed concern that the resolution was coming at a bad time, as the major powers are in the midst of delicate negotiations to get six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear program to resume.

"We have reservations about the necessity of adopting such a resolution in the current situation," according to a statement read to the conference.

The statement said China felt the North Korean nuclear issue should be resolved "through dialogue and consultations and not through exerting pressures or confrontations."

IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei has said North Korea is a dangerous example of a country pulling out of the NPT, designed to stop nuclear proliferation, once it had the technology to make atomic weapons.

ElBaradei has said the NPT should be strengthened in order for such cases to be punished.

The IAEA brought North Korea before the UN Security Council in February 2003 for non-compliance with the NPT but the Security Council has refrained from imposing sanctions on Pyongyang.

The IAEA passed a similar resolution calling for North Korea to return to the international non-proliferation regime at its general conference last year.

Russian President Vladimir Putin called Wednesday for a resumption in the six-party talks between China, Japan, North and South Korea, Russia and the United States aimed at persuading North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions in return for economic benefits.

North Korea has balked at returning to the talks, hardening its stance since South Korea recently disclosed its own nuclear experiments -- to enrich uranium four years ago and to extract a small amount of plutonium in the 1980s.

Both enriched uranium and plutonium can be used to manufacture atomic bombs, but South Korea said its experiments were purely for academic purposes.

The IAEA resolution said the agency "strongly welcomes diplomatic efforts to facilitate a peaceful resolution of the DPRK (North Korea) nuclear issue and particularly welcomes the six-party talks which have taken place in Beijing since August 2003."