The six-party talks cannot be resumed if the United States refuses to settle the issue of US-imposed financial sanctions against enterprises of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), the country's leading newspaper Rodong Sinmun said on Tuesday.

"It is impossible to resume the six-party talks under such financial sanctions applied by the US upon the DPRK. This is the stand of the DPRK," said Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea.

"The prospect of the talks will depend on whether the US works hard to build confidence with the DPRK on the principle of mutual respect and equality or persists in its self-justified and unilateral acts," the newspaper said in a commentary.

The DPRK and the US once agreed to hold talks between the heads of the delegations to the six-party talks in order to take up and settle the issue of financial sanctions.

But the US diplomatic chief, when interviewed by the USA Today not long ago, openly said there is no need to hold DPRK-US bilateral talks over the lifting of the financial sanctions.

The commentary pointed out that if the United States truly seeks the resumption and progress of the six-party talks, it should take practical measures to lift the financial sanctions against the DPRK as soon as possible.

Before the fifth round of the six-party talks, the US government froze eight DPRK enterprises' assets in the United States, accusing them of "proliferating weapons of mass destruction" and "illegal dealing."

Source: Xinhua