With the third round of six-party talks on the Korean nuclear issue slated for June 23-26, the parties concerned mostly remain tight-lipped about their expectations for the upcoming four-day negotiations.

To prepare for the talks, the second working group meeting was started here Monday morning. The closed-door meeting will last two days but no further information has been tipped so far.

The six-party talks, involving China, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), the United States, the Republic of Korea (ROK), Russia and Japan, were launched to handle the nuclear issue on the Korean peninsular.

The first round of talks was held in Beijing from Aug. 26 to 28 last year and the second round in late February this year, during which the six parties agreed to set up a working group mechanism.

The group gathered for the first time in Beijing from May 12 to 15.

On their arrival on Saturday and Sunday, delegates to the second working group meeting were discreet in making comments. At the airport, the Japanese side said that the six-party talks were challenged by many difficulties and the results could not be predicted as the talks had not started yet, and the Russian delegation said that Russia expected the third round of talks to produce certain realistic results as the parties involved shared some consensus in stances.

But there were no immediate comments from other arriving delegations.

As host of the six-party talks, China earlier called for "reasonable expectations" on the third round of negotiations in view of the intricacy of the nuclear issue. But Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue said China will continue to engage itself in promoting peaceful negotiations to push the six-party talks forward.

After the previous two rounds of six-party talks and one working group meeting, the six parties have reached a consensus on such issues as peaceful solution to the nuclear issue through dialogue, a nuclear-weapon-free Korean Peninsula as the ultimate goal, and nuclear freezing as the first step to complete nuclear abandonment, while addressing the security concerns of the DPRK, the spokeswoman said.

It is in itself a sort of progress that the parties would sit down and continue their talks, regardless of the results, said experts.