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U.S., China Continue to Seek Talks With North Korea By Marina Malenic WASHINGTON — Senior U.S. and Chinese officials meeting here yesterday said they were confident that a diplomat solution to the standoff over North Korea’s nuclear programs could be achieved through six-party negotiations, despite Pyongyang’s decision to forgo the fourth round talks that had been expected last month (see GSN, Sept. 30). U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing said their countries and negotiating partners Japan, Russia and South Korea favored pressing for a solution through the established multilateral framework. “All the parties who attend the Beijing six-party talks and, actually, the entire international community, have expressed the views that the resolution of the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula through the six-party talks is the only feasible and correct option,” said Li. “I know that China and the United States have a common view that the six-party talks are the way to move forward to resolve the issue of nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula,” said Powell, adding that, “I know that our Russian, South Korean and Japanese friends feel the same way.” “We stand ready to engage with North Korea when they decide that they are ready to have another round of discussions,” he added. “They have, in recent weeks, indicated that they are still committed to the six-party talks and we’ll just have to wait and see when they can be rescheduled.” Powell said it is premature to consider whether North Korea’s case should be referred to the U.N. Security Council if the talks proved unproductive. “I think that the six-party framework is what we should be concentrating on and not any other means of dealing with this right now … because it serves the interests of all parties,” he said. “All of North Korea’s neighbors are involved in this. They have as much of an interest and an even greater equity in seeing a denuclearized peninsula than does the United States.” North Korea has reportedly decided to delay additional multilateral talks until it learns the outcome of the Nov. 2 U.S. presidential election. Last night, in the first of three debates between President George W. Bush and his Democratic rival Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.), Bush rejected bilateral talks with Pyongyang (see related GSN story, today). Citing the now-defunct 1994 U.S.-North Korean nuclear agreement, Bush said, “A better way to approach the issue was to get other nations involved,” because North Korea would be more prone to abide by a multilateral agreement. “If [North Korean leader] Kim Jong Il decides again to not honor an agreement, he’s not only doing injustice to America, he’d be doing injustice to China, as well.” Kerry said he would open a bilateral discussion to supplement the multilateral talks. “I want bilateral talks which put all the issues from the Armistice of 1952, the economic issues, the human rights issues, the artillery disposal issues, the DMZ issues and the nuclear issues on the table,” he said. Bush countered, “The minute we have bilateral talks, the six-party talks will unwind. It’s exactly what Kim Jong Il wants.”
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