Senior diplomats from the United States, Japan and South Korea will probably meet early next month to discuss possible security assurances for North Korea, a Japanese government source said on Friday.

A Japanese government source said senior officials from the United States and its two key Asian allies were expected to hold "informal" talks aimed at working out details of a possible security guarantee for communist North Korea in exchange for the scrapping of its nuclear weapons program.

But the source, speaking on condition of anonymity, declined to give details including the exact timing and the venue for the meeting.

The source said the three countries would work out details after a high-profile visit later this month to the North Korea capital, Pyongyang, by China's parliament chief Wu Bangguo.

"We must first see North Korea's response after meetings between Wu Bangguo and North Korean leaders," the source said.

China announced on Thursday that Wu, head of the National People's Congress and number two in the Communist Party hierarchy, will visit North Korea from October 29 to 31.

During a Bangkok summit of Asia-Pacific leaders that ended on Tuesday, President Bush said he was sharing ideas on how to give North Korea security guarantees short of a non-aggression treaty that Pyongyang has demanded but Washington has ruled out. All 20 other summit leaders backed this stance.

North Korea has dismissed the U.S. offer of multilateral security guarantees as "laughable."

But analysts said that response was posturing while Pyongyang studied the offer. Bush vowed that Washington and its partners "will stay the course" despite North Korea's reaction and push for a resumption of six-party nuclear talks.

South Korea and the United States joined China, Japan and Russia in an inconclusive first round of talks with North Korea on its nuclear ambitions in Beijing in August.

A second round has yet to be arranged, but diplomats expect one to be held next month or at least before the end of the year.

A diplomatic source in Tokyo with close ties to Pyongyang said on Thursday that the North would contact U.S. officials soon to ascertain Washington's intentions before deciding whether to take part in a new round of the six-party talks.

The Japanese government source said he still saw the possibility of the second round of six-party talks being held in November.

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