Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada says North Korea seems anxious to hold bilateral talks with Tokyo.

Japan’s Kyodo News said Okada, while visiting Beijing, was citing Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi when he made the comment. Yang recently accompanied Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on a visit to North Korea.

Some view North Korea is expecting improved relations under the new Japanese government that was installed a little over a month ago.

Dialogue between the two countries has been severed since August of last year, when North Korea called then Prime Minister Taro Aso’s policies on the North “hostile.”