The third round of six-party nuclear talks will likely convene without another round of preparatory working-group meetings.

At their working group talks held in Beijing last week, the two Koreas, the United States, China, Russia and Japan agreed to meet in a second round of working group talks to pave the way for high-level nuclear talks.

A government official said Tuesday that, even though the six nations agreed to hold a second round of preparatory talks, Seoul is pushing to leapfrog it to proceed on to the main nuclear discussions, since North Korea and the United States have little chances of narrowing down their differences.

He said Seoul plans to make such a proposal to Beijing and Washington via diplomatic channels.