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U.S. Wants China to Place Economic Pressure on North Korea to Prompt Resumption of Nuclear Talks
China should use economic pressure to bring North Korea back to the six-nation talks on its nuclear program, a senior U.S. official said yesterday (see GSN, June 23). Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Robert Joseph suggested China had not taken advantage of all its leverage with North Korea in the multilateral diplomatic effort to resolve the standoff. “It is very much in China’s interest to exert as much influence as it can,” he said. “They do provide a great deal of sustenance to North Korea,” said Joseph, referring to food and energy aid. However, when asked if Washington wanted China to cut food assistance to the impoverished North, Joseph said, “I did not say China should cut off food.” “China has to make a decision how to influence North Korea,” he said. “It has a number of tools.” “There possibly could be very significant consequences for U.S.-Chinese relations” if Beijing does not take further steps to persuade Pyongyang to resume negotiations, Joseph added. “But we are trying to work as partners,” he said (Barry Schweid, Associated Press/Baltimore Sun, June 23). South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun yesterday encouraged North Korean leader Kim Jong Il to make good on his pledge that a nuclear-free Korean peninsula was the last will of his late father, North Korea founder Kim Il Sung, and remained his country’s aspiration, Agence France-Presse reported. “President Roh Moo-hyun took note that chairman Kim Jong Il had underlined the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula as the last will of President Kim Il Sung and stressed that he should make a determination as early as possible to peacefully resolve the nuclear issue,” said Roh spokesman Kim Man-soo (Agence France-Presse, June 23). Pyongyang, meanwhile, denounced U.S. President George W. Bush yesterday for meeting with a defector who wrote about his experiences in a North Korean prison camp, saying the encounter threw a “wet blanket” over efforts to resume nuclear talks, Reuters reported. “Given the fact that the chief executive of the world’s only superpower did sit face to face with such a human trash and conferred with him over human rights performance and other serious matters, it is not hard to guess the political level and stature of the present U.S. administration,” Pyongyang’s official KCNA news agency announced. Bush met with Kang Chol Hwan, now a South Korean journalist and author of The Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag, for about 40 minutes in the Oval Office last week. “The president read the book; it is a compelling story. The president is very concerned about the human rights situation in North Korea,” White House spokesman Scott McClellan said after the June 13 meeting. KCNA added that bringing up human rights at any future talks would complicate negotiations on the nuclear issue. The United States, however, has said it wants to discuss human rights if relations with North Korea are to be normalized, Reuters reported (Frances Yoon, Reuters, June 23). Elsewhere, foreign ministers from the Group of Eight leading industrialized nations yesterday urged Pyongyang to resume disarmament talks, AFP reported. The officials discussed “North Korea’s record of WMD-related activities,” according to a statement prepared by British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. “This remains of profound concern to us all. We urge North Korea to return promptly to the six-party talks in order to continue discussions on a comprehensive solution,” the statement says. The solution must include “the verifiable dismantlement of (North Korea’s) nuclear weapons related programs,” the officials added (Agence France-Presse/Channel NewsAsia, June 23).
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