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North Korea: Powell Meets Jiang Zemin, But No Agreement Reached After four hours of meetings in Beijing with President Jiang Zemin and senior Chinese officials, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the two countries had not agreed to a shared strategy on North Korea or Iraq (see GSN, Feb. 20). The White House wants China to pressure Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear aspirations, the New York Times reported. “I think they are anxious to play as helpful a role as they can” regarding North Korea, Powell said. “I think they will play that role quietly,” he added. Powell also met with Chinese Vice President Hu Jintao, who is set to assume the country’s top position. There are “new ideas” being discussed to bring Pyongyang to negotiate an end to the crisis, according to Powell (James Dao, New York Times, Feb. 24). Powell also issued a warning to North Korea on its alleged weapons program. “I cannot emphasize enough how seriously all of us would view any move by North Korea toward reprocessing of the spent fuel rods and production of nuclear weapons,” he said (see GSN, Jan. 31). The next stop on Powell’s East Asian trip is South Korea, where he is scheduled to meet with President-elect Roh Moo-hyun, who will take office tomorrow. Roh urged the United States to view North Korea as a partner in negotiations. “North Korea was opening up and … is already changing,” Roh said. “If we give them what they desperately want — regime security, normal treatment and economic assistance — they will be willing to give up their nuclear ambitions. We should not, therefore, treat them as criminals but as partners in negotiations,” he added (Charles Whelan, Agence France-Presse, Feb. 24). Food Aid to Resume Powell said Saturday that the United States would soon resume food shipments to ease North Korean hunger (see GSN, Feb. 12). “The need is still great. You go through all the politics; there are kids out there that are starving. If we can help them, we will,” Powell said. The World Food Program said that it cannot feed large areas of North Korea because of insufficient international support. The United States has not contributed to the program since December, Knight Ridder news agency reported. The U.S. Congress recently granted budgetary authority that will allow donations to resume, according to Powell (Michael Zielenziger, Knight Ridder/San Jose Mercury News, Feb. 22).
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