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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| North Korea Said to Reject China's Bid on Nuclear Talks |
| 2005-04-09 |
| NYT - Reg Req'd - posting it all After two senior-level meetings between North Korean and Chinese leaders over the last two weeks to discuss the North's nuclear-weapons program, the Chinese have failed so far to persuade North Korea to rejoin nuclear disarmament talks, senior administration officials and diplomats said Friday. not enough pressure? "rail accident" didn't work? As a result of the continuing deadlock, informal discussions have begun among the five parties to the talks on new, more aggressive strategies that could be used if and when it is decided that the talks have reached a dead end. Curb your dog, China - prove you're at least a regional power before you pretend to be a world power Among the steps being discussed, the administration officials and diplomats said, are increasing the frequency and intensity of United States and South Korean military exercises in the region. Even now, North Korea grows incensed with each exercise. Seething and Juche, Ver 9.043 In addition, intelligence gathering operations and reconnaissance about the North would be increased in a manner that the North Korean government would be sure to notice, the officials said. And enforcement activities against North Koreans involved in drug trafficking and weapons smuggling, among other illegal activities, would be expanded, possibly including increased patrols that might lead to interceptions of North Korean ships. Two years ago, Australian authorities seized a North Korean ship carrying 110 pounds of heroin off Australia's southern coast. No decision has been reached to step up the use of these tactics. For the past year and a half, under a program called the Proliferation Security Initiative, the five nations have declared themselves ready to intercept ships that may be carrying illicit cargo, but there has not been an actual interdiction recently. how about a "loss at sea"? Senior diplomats said the parties had agreed informally that they would continue holding out for North Korea's return to the talks until June, when a year will have passed since North Korea walked away. American officials say they have set no deadlines for the North Koreans to return. But now, "there is a palpable sense of frustration," a senior administration official said. China told the United States this week that North Korea had agreed in principle to return to the talks, " 'when the conditions are right' - the same they have been saying for months," the official said on Friday. "Nothing has changed, as far as I am concerned," he added. "Nice try" Also on Friday, Richard A. Boucher, the State Department spokesman, said, "We still do not have a clear commitment from the North Koreans to come back to the talks, or a date that they would come back to the talks." All of the officials and diplomats said that at least for a few more weeks, they will continue pushing North Korea to return to the talks. Now that's tough talk! During her visit to Beijing on March 21, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pressed the Chinese to put pressure on North Korea. Since then, North Korea's prime minister, Pak Pong Ju, and the first vice foreign minister, Kang Sok Ju, have visited Beijing. Mr. Kang is in charge of the nuclear disobedience issue. Several officials and diplomats noted that, while Mr. Pak was in Beijing last month, the Chinese government also agreed to grant North Korea significant new loan guarantees, though the details were not known. Officials also pointed out that Chinese trade with North Korea has increased significantly over the last year. One Asian diplomat put the rate of increase at 40 percent. Oh boy! That'll help! Is China a paper dragon? Reports from the region suggest that China is still holding out a significant buttplug carrot for the North Koreans should they change their minds and return to the disarmament talks - a state visit by President Hu Jintao. It would be the first visit to Pyongyang by a Chinese leader since September 2000. However, Japan's Kyodo news agency, quoting diplomats in Beijing, reported that because Mr. Kang "took a tough attitude" during his meetings in Beijing, China was saying "it has become difficult" to schedule President Hu's visit. On Tuesday, the head of North Korea's Parliament, Choe Thae Bok, said there was "no justification" for a return to the talks. The North Korean government has called for a session of its rubber-stamp Parliament for next Monday. No one knows for certain what the Parliament will be asked to do, but given Mr. Choe's remark, some diplomats are speculating that it will be asked to ratify North Korea's decision not to return to the talks. In the days since Mr. Pak's visit to Beijing, North Korea has issued several bellicose statements that have discouraged the five nations involved in the negotiations with the North - South Korea, Japan, China, Russia an the United States. Agence France-Presse reported that in a speech on Friday, Kim Yon Chun, the North Korean Army chief of staff, said that Washington's "persistent hostile policy" would prompt the North to further "bolster its self-defensive nuclear deterrent." "and juche, and army first, and stuff!" North Korea regularly issues statements with conditions, demands or objections on a range of topics, and the senior State Department official said American policy now is to try not to respond to any of them. On March 31, however, North Korea issued a new statement that caught everyone's attention. "Now that the D.P.R.K. has become a full-fledged nuclear weapons state, the six-party talks should be disarmament talks where the participant countries negotiate the issue on an equal footing," the Foreign Ministry said, referring to North Korea by the initials of its formal name. With that, the officials and diplomats said, North Korea seemed to be saying it should be regarded as a legitimate nuclear power on a par with the United States, Russia or China. "From that, it would be very difficult to go back to the assumption that they unilaterally have to disarm," a diplomat from one of the five nations said. "This one could possibly change the whole basis of the negotiations." Several diplomats and officials said they learned that even China was unpleasantly surprised by the new statement. The senior State Department official said the United States found the statement "very unhelpful," but added "we're not quite sure what it really means." The official said he was quite upset when he first learned of the new position but added, "one of my rules is always to apply what I call the North Korean discount to these statements," meaning they may not always be as serious as they seem. |
| Posted by:Frank G |
| #5 It's also a humiliating display of Beijing's inability or unwillingness to coerce a recalcitrant client at the time they are attempting to increase their influence in their near abroad. The longer it goes, the dumber they look. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2005-04-09 7:26:56 PM |
| #4 as long as they don't export their poison |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-04-09 6:35:52 PM |
| #3 This is more evidence that Steven Den Beste is right: what we're doing is a strategy called "engaged apathy". We don't really care if these clowns ever come back to the table or not. We're just waiting for them to implode, or for some general to take out Kimmie. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2005-04-09 6:32:57 PM |
| #2 No Sea of FireTM? The wanker's lost his fastball, all right. |
| Posted by: Raj 2005-04-09 5:32:21 PM |
| #1 Equal footing? WTF. The Norks might have a few nukes, we have at a minimum hundreds deployed and many more in storage. There is no equal footing. If we decided to remove the NORKS from the map we could do so. All the NORKS can do is talk shit. We can actually act. no need for us to talk shit. Screw these assclowns both north and south. Get us the hell out of South Korea and let these North Korean fudgepackers starve. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet 0’ Doom 2005-04-09 1:45:20 AM |