Seoul, South Korea ? North Korea has agreed to revive stalled dialogue with the Washington and Seoul, and is willing to meet with an American envoy, a South Korean official said Saturday upon returning from the communist North.

“The two sides (Koreas) have agreed to restore to normal South-North relations that have temporarily been frozen,” the South Korean envoy, Lim Dong-won, told a nationally televised news conference in Seoul.

Lim also said North Korean leader Kim Jong Il “has expressed willingness to open dialogue with the United States, and will accept a U.S. envoy’s visit to the North.”

State Department officials were unavailable for comment Friday night but have said for months the administration is willing to meet with North Korean officials at any time, in any place. Until now, North Korea had balked at Washington’s offer to restart talks.

U.S. relations with North Korea deteriorated sharply and dialogue ground to a halt after President Bush in January labeled North Korea  along with Iran and Iraq  as part of “an axis of evil” countries with ambitions to develop weapons of mass destruction.

During his extended four-day stay in the North, Lim conducted talks with Kim Jong-Il on stalled inter-Korean dialogue and icy relations between Washington and Pyongyang.

Kim Jong-Il said he accepts a proposed visit to North Korea by Jack Pritchard, Washington’s pointman on the reclusive communist country, Lim said. The date of the U.S. envoy’s visit will be set in contacts between Washington and Pyongyang, he said.

Lim said he understands that Donald Gregg, a former U.S. ambassador to South Korea, “either began his visit to the North on Friday, or was about to arrive Saturday.”

Lim said he had conveyed to the North Korean leader a message from South Korean President Kim Dae-jung urging Pyongyang to break out of isolation and build ties with the outside world, especially with the United States and Japan.

The envoy said the North Korean leader responded “positively.”

After walking across the border on Saturday at the border truce village of Panmunjom, 35 miles north of Seoul, Lim told reporters that his trip to the North “yielded more good results than expected.”

Lim said he explained to North Korean leaders about the emergence of a new global security environment that has built since the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

The South Korean envoy said the North Korean leader appeared to have “a good understanding of the grave international situation” being faced by his reclusive, poor country.