The U.S. is known to have refused North Korea’s proposal to hold a bilateral high-level military meeting last month.

A South Korean government source said Saturday that North Korea proposed to the U.S. on January 25th that the two countries hold a high-level military meeting.

The North made the proposal in the name of North Korean People’s Armed Forces Minister Kim Yong-chun to U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates via the U.S. embassy in China.

As for the agenda for the meeting, North Korea sought devising of ways to ease military tensions near the inter-Korean sea border in the Yellow Sea, denuclearization, and the excavation of the remains of U.S. soldiers in North Korea.

However, the U.S. turned down the North’s proposal, saying that inter-Korean dialogue should precede talks between Pyongyang and Washington. The U.S. added that measures to ease military tensions should be discussed through the United Nations Command Military Armistice Commission, not at a high-level military meeting between the U.S. and North Korea.

South and North Korea held a working-level military meeting early this month to prepare for bilateral high-level military talks. But the preparatory meeting collapsed as North Korea continued to criticize South Korea for accusing it of sinking a South Korean naval vessel in March of last year. The North said that the accusation was an “ultra large-scale scheme” to frame it up.