Well I'll Be Darned -- Norks Ignore Deadline to Shut Down Nuke Plant [Andy McCarthy]
Here's the state of play: We made a deal with North Korea, serial liars, that would give them all kinds of goodies on a promise to shut down their nuclear weapons program, rather than a demand that they turn over whatever they'd produced — in the years since 1994 of violating the last naive deal we made with them — before they get any of the goodies.
The State Department said this deal was worth doing because this time there were real deadlines and this time the Chinese were involved and were going to be mad as hell, just like us, if the Norks didn't comply.
The deal stipulated that within 60 days — i.e., by today — North Korea would, as the NYTimes puts it, "deactivate and seal its main plant at Yongbyon, invite back international inspectors, and provide a preliminary accounting of how much plutonium it has produced."
It turned out that the U.S. Treasury Department had frozen $25M in funds the Norks had squirreled away at a bank in Macao. The funds are the proceeds of criminal activities sponsored by Kim Jong Il's regime, including drug trafficking and the counterfeiting of U.S. currency. The $25M is probably just the tip of the iceberg, and other banks are involved, but the administration is mum on that because the banks involved belong to our great allies, the Chinese.
The State Department told the Norks they were not getting their $25M back. The Norks replied, "Either we get it back or we don't comply with the deal on the nukes."
Despite pleas from critics of the deal, the administration blinked — the State Department told the Norks they could have their money ... but only if it was used for humanitarian purposes.
The Norks said, not good enough — we want the money back, no strings attached.
The administration blinked again. We gave Kim Jong Il back the proceeds of his racketeering activity. The State Department assured us that this was worth doing to solidify the dubious nuke deal — notwithstanding that it had not been a condition of North Korean compliance in the first place.
Now, today's deadline has come and gone — no deactivation and sealing of the main plant; no invitation for the international inspectors to come back; and no preliminary accounting of how much plutonium has been produced — to say nothing of uranium enrichment.
The Bush administration, though silent, is said to be "very angry." The Chinese are said to be counselling "patience."
What a bargain.
corner.nationalreview.com |
