North Korea's top governing body on Sunday proposed high-level nuclear and security talks with the United States in an appeal sent just days after calling off talks with rival South Korea.
China has deliberately snubbed North Korea by inviting South Korea's recently elected president to Beijing, while officials hectored a high-level delegation from Pyongyang last week and issued no such invitation to the North's third-generation hereditary leader, Kim Jong-Un.
A North Korean delegation to China appears to have been gently snubbed ahead of a meeting Friday with Chinese President Xi Jinping, according to one regional analyst, who say the visitors' treatment is part of Beijing's effort to reign in its troublesome, isolated and poverty stricken neighbor.
Kenneth Bae, the American sentenced to hard labor in North Korea for supposed hostile acts against the state, headed off to prison on Wednesday, the start of his 15-year term.
North Korea has replaced its hard-line defense minister with a younger, little-known army general, state media indicated Monday, a move analysts see as an attempt by new leader Kim Jong-un to solidify his grip on the isolated communist state's powerful military.
NBA legend Dennis Rodman said he's headed back to North Korea for another up-front-and-close meeting with dictator Kim Jong-un to talk about freeing a jailed American.
Ex-NBA star Dennis Rodman made a street plea to North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-un, about the release of a Korean-American that's been sentenced and jailed: "Do me a solid."
The days in which North Korean leaders could manufacture an international crisis and extract concessions from its neighbors are over, President Obama declared during a news conference with South Korean President Park Geun-hye at the White House.
The Pentagon's top general this week predicted that the U.S. pivot to Asia and increased support for alliances in the region will produce "friction" with China.
