Christopher Hill, the US ambassador to South Korea and newly-appointed chief US delegate to six-party talks on the nuclear issue, also called for a "coordinated" approach by US allies to defuse the confrontation.

"We had a very good discussion about the six-party process and the absolute agreement on the need for North Korea to come back to the process," said Hill, who made a one-day trip to China on Thursday.

"And the Chinese authorities were very clear that they are pressing for the DPRK (North Korea) to come back and that they absolutely share that goal of ours," he said.

Hill and South Korea's chief negotiator, Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-Soon, held separate meetings with Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing and leading Chinese diplomats on Thursday.

"Under the present intricate and complex situation, all parties concerned should remain patient, determined and confident," Li was quoted as telling Hill in a report posted on China's foreign ministry website.

"In order to prevent the situation from becoming more complicated (all sides) should make constructive efforts to resume the six-party talks as early as possible," he said.

In talks with Song, Li praised South Korean efforts at trying to improve relations with its northern neighbor, but reiterated Beijing's stance that North Korea's security concerns needed to be taken into account.

"China supports a non-nuclear Korean peninsula and at the same time stands for resolving North Korea's reasonable concerns," Li said.

"The Chinese side supports the continued efforts of the South Korean side in improving North-South relations on the peninsula."

The visits come one week after North Korea declared publicly that it now possessed nuclear weapons and would no longer take part in the talks.

The discussions in Bejing are expected to be followed by a weekend visit to Pyongyang by Wang Jiarui, a special envoy from China, the broker and host of the six-party talks and North Korea's closest ally.

Hill said in Seoul that Washington was committed to a peaceful solution of the nuclear issue, saying that the United States was trying to help North Korea overcome its "big mistake".

"We will try to construct an agreement that will enable them to get out of the weapons, out of the nuclear weapons business, and into the business of trying to develop their economy and trying to integrate the rest of the world, which is the only outcome that any person should want for the DPRK," he said.

Hill sidestepped a question on whether the US government was opposed to Seoul complying with Pyongyang's request for 500,000 tonnes of fertilizer aid for this spring.

"I'm certainly not going to be giving advice to the ROK (South Korea) when they received the request for fertilizer," he said.

"Again, I think it's very important we coordinate various initiatives, we coordinate our approaches to the DPRK," Hill said.

"What we need to do is to coordinate our approaches and make sure that the DPRK does not try to exploit any differences among any of the partners in the six-party process," he said.

The nuclear standoff erupted in October 2002 when the United States accused North Korea of operating a weapons programme based on highly enriched uranium, violating a 1994 arms control agreement.

The last set of six-way talks -- involving the two Koreas, Russia, China, Japan, and the United States -- took place in June last year but produced few results.

North Korea shunned a fourth round set for last September, complaining of "hostile" US policies.

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