SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korea said Friday that Russia "took note" of its decision to boycott international nuclear talks when their top diplomats met, indicating there was no breakthrough in Moscow’s efforts to get Pyongyang back to the negotiating table.

North Korea last week expelled international nuclear monitors, vowed to restart its atomic program and quit disarmament negotiations after the U.N. Security Council condemned its April 5 rocket launch and called for expanded sanctions.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov flew to Pyongyang seeking to persuade the North to return to the nuclear negotiating table. He held talks with Foreign Minister Pak Ui Chun on Thursday.

"The Russian side ... took note of our position that six-party talks are no longer necessary," said a Foreign Ministry statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

The North says the U.N. rebuke was unfair because the rocket was launching a satellite. But the U.S. and others believe it was a test of long-range missile technology.

Pyongyang also said Russia recognized each country has the right to launch a satellite into space and reaffirmed its opposition to U.N. sanctions against North Korea.

That position appears to contradict Russia’s support of the U.N. statement adopted after the rocket launch in which Moscow joined other Security Council members in denouncing the liftoff as a violation of a resolution barring the North from ballistic missile activity.

Lavrov could also meet with the leader Kim Jong Il, reports have said, but the North’s statement made no mention of such a meeting.