Ra Jong-yil, a senior national security adviser, is to visit China on Wednesday after a two-day trip to Russia, his office said.

"We hope the visit will help strengthen cooperation in the fields of diplomacy and security," presidential spokeswoman Song Kyoung-hee told reporters.

The visit to Russia and China follows talks in Washington between ROK Foreign Minister Yoon Young-kwan and US officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Colin Powell.

The trips by Ra and Yoon are part of Seoul's efforts to narrow divisions with Washington on how to handle the five-month-old nuclear issue.

Cheney will visit Seoul in mid-April ahead of a planned summit between President George W. Bush and ROK President Roh Moo-hyun.

Roh has ruled out the use of sanctions or military action against the DPRK. Washington has said it is keeping all options open while seeking a peaceful solution to the DPRK issue.

Meanwhile, the DPRK condemned ROK yesterday for planning to contribute non-combat troops to the US-led war on Iraq, which it called a test run for a US attack on the Korean Peninsula.

The DPRK accuses Washington of planning to target it after Iraq.

"The Iraqi war is a test for the second Korean War," said the ruling Workers' Party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun.

It said the ROK authorities deserve "curses and denunciation" for planning to send 700 military engineers and medics to support the war in Iraq, which it called "a vicious challenge to the sovereignty of an independent country."

ROK President Roh has called the dispatch a "strategic choice," and said close US-ROK ties are essential for peacefully resolving the nuclear issue.

(Xinhua News Agency March 31, 2003)