"During the visit, Vice President Xi Jinping will exchange views on issues of common concern including the nuclear issue on the Korean peninsula," China's foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told journalists.

The visit would be Xi's first trip abroad since he was elected vice president in March, Qin said. Following his stopover in Pyongyang, Xi will go on to Saudia Arabia, Qatar and Yemen.

The specific agenda of his visit to Pyongyang was still being worked out and a meeting with the North's leader Kim Jong-Il was under consultation, Qin said.

Qin refused to say whether North Korea would handover during the visit the full declaration of its nuclear activities, a key step agreed to in a landmark denuclearisation pact.

"On the nuclear declaration and other specific issues, the six-party talks are still having intensive consultations and coordination," Qin said.

"I have no schedule at the moment," he said when asked about the declaration.

The North agreed last year to disable nuclear plants at its key Yongbyon facility in exchange for aid and diplomatic recognition in a deal reached with the United States, China, Japan, Russia and South Korea.

As part of the six-party agreement, Pyongyang was to hand over a full declaration of all its nuclear activities by December 31 last year.

But disputes over the declaration have blocked the start of the final phase of the process -- the permanent dismantling of the plants and the handover of all atomic material.

North Korea protested Thursday over what it said was the "very slow" pace of energy assistance it has received from the six-party partners.

The complaint emerged when the two Koreas met at the truce border village of Panmunjom to work out details on further energy aid under the agreement.

Qin said that China was maintaining close contact with North Korea on the denuclearisation issue and urged the other four parties to make joint efforts to make more progress in the talks.

The six-party talks began in Beijing in 2003, but were in danger of collapsing after North Korea exploded its first nuclear device in October 2006.

Xi was elected as vice president in March in a promotion analysts saw as underlining his credentials to replace Hu when the latter steps down in five years' time.

All rights reserved. © 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.