A top diplomatic aide to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Sunday he does not expect multilateral talks on the North Korean nuclear standoff to lead to a "good agreement."

"I suspect that North Korea may be buying time until it possesses practical nuclear weapons," Yukio Okamoto said on an NHK TV talk show. "I do not think a good agreement will come from an extension of the framework of the talks."

North Korea said during a meeting with the United States and China in Beijing on Wednesday that it possesses nuclear weapons and has started reprocessing spent fuel rods, which would enable it to make more nuclear arms.