The Six Party Talks on North Korea, which reconvened in Beijing today, have not just failed to make progress in their goal of halting Pyongyang’s nuclear programme. They have made negative progress.

When they began, four years ago, North Korea was a militarised state with nuclear weapons potential; with its underground test last October, it became a member of the nuclear club. That is why there is such excitement about the latest meeting. Expectations are now so low that any progress, any whatsoever, will representative a relative triumph.

But don’t expect much. At best, the US and North Korea, plus China, Japan, Russia and South Korea, will come through the talks without a major falling out and with an agreement to meet again. Just conceivably they will come up with a rough outline of steps towards a compromise by which the North Koreans would freeze their nuclear plant at Yongbyon in return for the unfreezing of bank accounts.

This would be nothing more than a return to the situation in September 2005, just before the US froze the bank accounts in Macau enraging the North. In Six Party Talks Terms, such a modest outcome would be a massive success.

The spin put on the talks will be all about “concessions” on the North Korean side. Kim Jong Il is no doubt feeling a bit more squeezed by sanctions imposed after the nuke test, but the country is so ground down by economic collapse anyway that such limited steps are never going to be decisive.

In fact, progress has become possible because of a huge step down by the Americans. Having insisted all along that they would only deal with Pyongyang in a multi-lateral, round table setting, they have been conducting intensive bilateral discussions in Germany and China. Yesterday the chief US negotiator, Chris Hill, had to deny reports that they had actually cut a preliminary deal with the North in Berlin last month.

Many more rounds of talks lie between the current impasse and a full resolution. The North has no trust whatsoever in President Bush, who has made it clear that he would like nothing more than to see Mr Kim’s head on a spike. It’s inconceivable that anything like a comprehensive deal will be achieved under the current US administration.

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