"We plan to make an important proposal that would solve the nuclear problem in an essential way if six-way talks are resumed," South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-Young said on a visit to Tokyo.

"The North Korean nuclear issue must be solved through serious give-and-take negotiations," he said.

"North Korea should promise to abandon its nuclear program and accept thorough inspections while the United States would guarantee the current regime and normalize relations," he said.

But he refused to disclose details on the proposal, saying it was "not the right time."

"After consulting with countries concerned, South Korea will put this proposal on the table," he told the forum organized by the Nihon Keizai economic daily.

South Korea first said it had the unspecified proposal last week when it met with its neighbor for the first time in 10 months and agreed to give it fertilizer aid.

But the inter-Korean talks failed to reach a breakthrough to get North Korea back to the table of six-nation talks.

Pyongyang has accused the United States of hostility and boycotted the six-nation talks on its nuclear program that include the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States.

In February, it said it had a nuclear deterrent to defend itself.

Chung was in Japan as his country asked for an apology after a top Japanese official said Washington no longer trusted Seoul.

Chung declined to discuss the dispute but said, "the South Korea-US alliance will be maintained in a solid manner."

South Korean President Roh Moo-Hyun and US President George W. Bush are due to meet on June 10 in Washington.

Relations between Seoul and Tokyo have been hurt in recent weeks by a territorial dispute over an island in the sea that separates the two countries as well as new Japanese history books that gloss over Tokyo's imperialist past.

"It is true that neighboring countries are now concerned about some (Japanese) people's recognition of history ... which can be taken as denial of the postwar pacifism," Chung said.

It is "natural that citizens in East Asia worry that the history of the unfortunate past may be repeated after seeing Japanese leaders' visits to the Yasukuni Shrine where Class-A war criminals are venerated together" with other war dead, he said.

The Tokyo shrine honors 2.5 million Japanese war dead including 14 top or Class-A war criminals. Annual pilgrimages by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and other leaders have angered South Korea, China and other nations which fell victim to Japan's aggression before and during World War II.

"I hope Japan, which achieved high economic growth on exceptional demand at the time of the 1950 Korea War, will play a big role ... in bringing peace and prosperity to the Korean Peninsula," Chung said.

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