Japan and North Korea remained far apart Monday at the end of their latest talks on normalizing relations, again failing to make substantive progress and again each blaming the other for intransigence on key issues, officials said.
Spokesmen for both nations acknowledged their only progress was that the talks continued over four days. The previous round, in May, collapsed over Japan's demand for information on a Japanese woman reportedly kidnapped and held by North Korea.Despite the attempts to put the best face on the meetings, the officials said neither nation had budged on key disagreements that have prevented any substantive movement since the talks began.In other news . . . THE LAUNCH of an Aries rocket carrying Star Wars experiments was postponed a second time early Monday because of a technical problem, Air Force officials said in Cape Canaveral, Fla. . . . AN OUTBREAK of cholera in eastern Japan that has already killed one person has spread to the Tokyo area, health authorities said Monday. NEW ZEALAND has banned the import of semiautomatic firearms and pump action shotguns after the use of such weapons in mass murders both there and in Australia, the Customs Ministry said Monday.