Sydney, Australia ? In an unexpected twist, President Bush’s bout of diplomacy in Asia hit a snag in dealings with longtime ally South Korea and drew a conciliatory gesture from “Axis of Evil” member North Korea.

Just hours after Bush suffered an awkward moment Friday with South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun over terms for ending the Korean War, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill announced a breakthrough in efforts to get North Korea to abandon its nuclear program.

North Korea has invited nuclear experts from the United States, China and Russia into the country to survey and recommend ways of disabling all of its atomic facilities by the end of the year, Hill, the chief U.S. envoy to the communist regime, announced Friday. The team will go next week.

Hill called the overture “another significant step toward the de-nuclearization” of the Korean peninsula.

Bush was wrapping up his Asia visit today, joining Australian Prime Minister John Howard and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for breakfast in a glassed-in room on the 31st floor of a hotel overlooking the Opera House on a drizzly morning.

The president then met with Indonesian President Bambang Yudhoyono, an anti-terror partner whom Bush thanked “very much for your strength in this struggle against extremists.”

“You understand firsthand what it means to deal with radicals,” the president said.

He was attending a final session of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum and then heading home. Activist groups have called for a major demonstration today of about 20,000 protesting Bush, the Iraq war and APEC’s pro-business agenda. About 1,000 gathered at a rally Friday, with some scuffling with police near a hotel where some summit delegates are staying.

Bush’s weeklong foreign trip started with a surprise visit to Anbar province in Iraq and he returns to a big week in Washington for his Iraq strategy.

In an unexpected confrontation, Roh publicly challenged Bush during a picture-taking session to pledge support for “a declaration to end the Korean War.” That conflict ended in a truce in 1953, not with a peace treaty, so the two sides technically remain at war.

Bush said North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has “got to get rid of his (nuclear) weapons in a verifiable fashion” for the United States to agree to sign a peace treaty. Roh told Bush he should “be a bit clearer in your message” and Bush shot back “I can’t make it any more clear, Mr. President.”