President Roh Moo-hyun says he has long believed that North Korea will abandon its nuclear weapons program and that such belief has not changed.

The U.S. TV network CNN said in a press release Thursday that Mr. Roh made the remark in an interview with CNN in Seoul two days ago.

The president said he and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il agreed on the need to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula during their summit talks in early October, calling him a man with flexible thinking.

On South Korea-U.S. relations, Roh said that from the beginning of his administration, he and U.S. President George W. Bush had differences of opinion on the North Korean nuclear issue.

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