BEIJING -- The top U.S. official on disarmament issues arrived in Beijing Sunday for talks on North Korea as the U.S. increases diplomatic efforts to find a solution to the nuclear crisis, AFP reported.

U.S. Undersecretary of State for International Security and Arms Control John Bolton, who arrived in Beijing Sunday afternoon, is one of a string of U.S. officials to visit China in recent days for consultations with North Korea's closest ally.

Bolton is expected to hold talks with senior Chinese officials, including vice-foreign ministers Wang Guangya and Li Zhaoxing today.

Washington hopes Beijing can persuade North Korea to not only abandon its nuclear program but become more amenable to working toward an end to the three-month-long standoff.

Bolton's discussions with Chinese officials will be focused on security and arms control matters, U.S. and Chinese officials have said.

Bolton declined to speak to reporters after arriving.

"I want to meet with Chinese colleagues first," he said.

The purpose of the visit, a U.S. official in Beijing said, is to carry out an agreement reached between U.S. President George W. Bush and Chinese President Jiang Zemin last year, during Jiang's visit to the United States, to hold regular discussions on strategic issues at the senior level.

"I think Iraq and North Korea are going to be on the agenda," the official said, adding that the whole range of issues regarding weapons proliferation will be covered in the talks.

Also traveling with Bolton is Stephen Rademaker, assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control.

Pyongyang in the past week has rejected a U.S. offer for dialogue and fired off a volley of anti-American rhetoric and on Sunday blasted Washington for trying to "internationalize" the issue by suggesting the UN should help broker an end to the crisis.

China has revealed little about what it is doing to try to ease tensions between Washington and Pyongyang, saying only that it did not want to see nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula and wanted to see the issue resolved through dialogue.

Russia, on the other hand, has been pushing for a deal that would see North Korea receive security guarantees, as Pyongyang has demanded, and economic aid in return for a commitment to revive a collapsed 1994 U.S.-North Korean deal under which Pyongyang froze its nuclear program.

Consultations with Beijing are considered crucial in bringing the brinkmanship to an end as China is a traditional ally and aid donor to the North and along with Russia may be the only countries with any influence with Pyongyang.

Bolton's trip comes hot on the heels of that of U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs James Kelly, who departed Beijing Friday.

Next month senior State Department official Richard Haass, who is charged with developing the long-term concepts underpinning U.S. Foreign Policy, will also visit China.

The United States cut off fuel aid to Pyongyang after Kelly said in October he had extracted an admission from North Korea that it was running a secret nuclear weapons program.

That triggered a crisis that has seen North Korea prepare to reactivate a nuclear plant that had been mothballed, expel UN monitors and withdraw from the international nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Bolton will travel to South Korea and Japan after leaving Beijing Tuesday.