Just a day after blasting North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il for forcing his people to live a "hellish nightmare" in Seoul, Bolton told reporters in Japan on Friday that his tough speech was part of a coordinated US strategy toward Pyongyang.

"Believe me, the speech that I gave was fully cleared," Bolton told a news conference at the US embassy, dismissing suggestions that his fiery attack on Kim represented an uncoordinated diplomatic faux pas by Washington.

"The important consequence here is that we have received such encouraging news about the prospects for multilateral discussions," he said.

In his scathing attack in a speech to a think-tank in Seoul, Bolton said Kim was "dead wrong" in believing nuclear weapons would help North Korea's security, insisting "indeed the opposite is true".

He was speaking after Russia and South Korea said North Korea had agreed to a US proposal for six-nation talks, made through China.

"The resolve that the (US, South Korean and Japanese) governments showed, all three of them, in telling the North Koreans through China ... that there wouldn't be substantive negotiations unless South Korea and Japan were in the room and at the table has paid off," he said.

Later Friday a North Korean foreign ministry spokesman told the country's official news agency that Pyongyang proposed six-way talks in New York on Thursday after receiving assurances from Washington that one-on-one talks with the United States would also take place.

"At the recent DPRK (North Korea)-US talks, the DPRK put forward a new proposal to have six party talks without going through the three party talks and to have the DPRK-US bilateral talks there," the Korean Central News Agency quoted the spokesman as saying.

He said Washington had notified Pyongyang through a third party that bilateral talks could take place in a multilateral framework.

This was the first official confirmation of the talks from North Korea.

The Russian foreign ministry said Thursday that Pyongyang had agreed to a US proposal to hold six-nation talks, given nearly two weeks ago to Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Dai Bingguo in Washington.

And Seoul had confirmed the message Friday, adding that North Korea informed South Korea, Japan, China, the United States and Russia at the same time of its intention to accept.

Bolton said details on the format and timing of the talks were expected to come from Beijing "if not today, within days", he said.

A US State Department official speaking on condition of anonymity said Thursday in Washington the talks could be held as early as next month.

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi welcomed North Korea's acceptance of the talks.

"Maybe North Korea is becoming flexible," Koizumi told reporters. "We should swiftly conduct the multinational talks, and North Korea should listen to voices of the international community."

Should the talks begin, it would be seen as a diplomatic victory for Washington over the crisis that erupted in October.

Until now North Korea has insisted on a non-aggression pact and one-on-one talks with the United States prior to any multilateral discussions.

Bolton reiterated Washington was prepared to deal -- but peacefully -- and at the bargaining table.

"We have no intent to invade North Korea, and as (US) Secretary (of State Colin) Powell put it, we can find a way to put that on a piece of paper," Bolton said. "But ... that's going to be resolved in the context of multilateral negotiations."

The nuclear crisis was triggered in October when Washington revealed that Pyongyang was running a nuclear programme in violation of a 1994 arms control accord.

North Korea kicked out UN nuclear inspectors late last year and then withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It has since claimed it has reprocessed 8,000 spent nuclear fuel rods after reopening its nuclear complex at Yongbyon, north of Pyongyang, frozen under the 1994 accord.

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