Japan eyes North Korea flood aid

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Japan is considering sending humanitarian aid to North Korea to help it recover from devastating floods.

Newly-installed Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura told journalists officials were discussing it and would make a decision as soon as possible.

Sending aid would be a reversal for Japan, which has previously linked aid to resolving a row over North Korea's abduction of Japanese citizens.

The two sides are due to hold bilateral talks in Mongolia next week.

'Natural disaster'

Japan has not sent any humanitarian aid to North Korea since late 2004, in protest at a lack of progress over Japanese nationals kidnapped by Pyongyang in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

It has also declined to provide aid promised to North Korea as part of a multilateral deal aimed at ending its nuclear programme.

South Korea has already sent aid supplies to the North

But Mr Machimura indicated that an exception could be made.

"There is a question of whether we should tag everything to the abduction issue," he told the Yomiuri newspaper.

"[The flooding] is basically a natural disaster and we have taken emergency measures on occasions like this despite our differences in principles, opinions and regimes," he said.

North Korea says that the flooding, caused by seasonal rains earlier this month, left around 600 people dead. Infrastructure and farmland have also been destroyed.

South Korea has begun sending food, drinking water and blankets, with construction materials to follow in September. International aid agencies are also working to assist North Korea.

A Japanese Foreign Ministry official said that Japan's move was in response to a United Nations appeal for aid.

Japanese and North Korean negotiators will discuss abduction and other issues at a meeting in the Mongolian capital, Ulan Bator, in early September.