Tokyo (AsiaNews) – In his State of the Union address on February 2, US president George W. Bush had little to say on the topic of North Korea, except that: "We are working closely with the governments in Asia to convince North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions."

Ten seconds to utter these words, but words as weighty to the intended interlocutor—Pyongyang—as they are short, words that were meant to be unequivocal.

This time, there was no hostile talk about North Korea being part with Iraq and Iran of an "axis of evil" as was the case in the President's 2002 speech.

Although Mr Bush spoke about collusion of some governments—Iran and Syria—with terrorists, he restrained from mentioning North Korea.

Such a moderate tone apparently surprised those who were more used to the harsher, gung ho anti-Kim Jong-il rhetoric of Bush's first term in office.

Still, even though diplomatic and strategic considerations demanded a new rhetoric, a softer tone does not however mean a softer policy.

On CNN, the US President acknowledged using hard words against the Pyongyang regime, but his goals are the same. The new-found diplomatic language is not a simple smokescreen but an indispensable tool to bring North Korea's nuclear programme under control.

The new language also reflects the new balance of power within the US Administration; the State Department now seems to be on the ascendant against the Defence Department.

For example, when President Bush signed into law in October 2004 the 'North Korean Human Rights Act', North Korean leaders were infuriated. However, this was almost immediately followed last January by a visit by Democratic Congressman Tom Lantos, a backer of the law, to Pyongyang where he held talks with North Korean Foreign Minister Paek Nam-sun.

Mr Lantos was told that North Korea would like to be treated with the diplomatic attention and respect that it deserves. He was also told that North Koreans would listen carefully to the President's State of the Union speech.

"I passed the message to the White House," Mr Lantos said, "and I am glad that the Administration followed my advice".

The strategic reason for this change is to get North Korea back to the six-nation nuclear talks with China as mediator. In addition to the US, North Korea and China, the other parties to the talks are South Korea, Russia and Japan.

So far the talks have involved two rounds of discussions. The third one, scheduled for September 2004, was cancelled when Pyongyang refused to participate because of what it deemed was a 'hostile' US attitude.

Now that the State of the Union speech used the right rhetoric, there are no excuses to delay renewing talks.

In the week leading up to the speech, Michael Green, senior director for Asian Affairs at the US National Security Council, stopped in Tokyo, Beijing and Seoul, carrying personal letters to  Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun.

This was designed to back the newly-found diplomatic language with diplomatic steps explaining the new approach. The most likely reason for this mission was to tell the Asian leaders that North Korea had sold uranium to Libya.

According to the Washington Post, the State Department found evidence of this commerce when examining documents provided by Libyan strongman Muammar Khadafi following his decision to give up his country's nuclear weapons programme.

Pyongyang had always denied having a uranium-enrichment plant and this refusal to own up remains the crux of the matter and the reason that talks between Pyongyang and Washington stalled in October 2002.

Now the leaders of the Communist nation will find it hard, if not impossible, to buy for more time. The US, its Asian allies and China are gearing up to jumpstart the six-nation talks.

On February 9, South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon is scheduled to visit Washington where he will meet the new Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, with the six-nation talks at the heart of their discussions.

At the same time, a top Chinese official will be in Pyongyang for the same reasons.

Many analysts are betting that the talks will be on very soon and that this time there will be concrete results.