The US says it would hold direct talks with North Korea to persuade it to return to stalled multilateral talks on ending its nuclear programme, BBC reported.
A spokesman for the US state department said that there had been no decision on when such talks might take place.
Philip Crowley insisted the move was not a policy shift and talks would take place within "the six-party process".
North Korea pulled out of multilateral talks in April after international criticism following a rocket launch.
"It's a bi-lateral discussion that (is) hopefully...within the six-party context, and it's designed to convince North Korea to come back to the six-party process and to take affirmative steps towards de-nuclearisation," Mr Crowley said from Washington.
He denied that accepting North Korea's offer of bi-lateral talks was a policy shift but called it a "short-term" measure to try and bring the reclusive state back to talks.
The BBC's John Sudworth, in South Korean capital, Seoul, says the decision does appear to be a tactical shift - suggesting that the US is now prepared to meet directly with the North before getting the commitment it had sought to the broader multilateral process.
Earlier this week, the US special envoy on North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, met in Asia with officials from Seoul, Beijing and Tokyo to discuss the talks.
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