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August 30, 2003
North Korea Says It Is Against More Talks
By JOSEPH KAHN - [The New York Times]
BEIJING, Aug. 30 - North Korea declared today that it sees no need to continue nuclear talks with the six nations it met in Beijing last week and has no choice but to strengthen its nuclear deterrent, sharply contradicting an agreement announced by China and potentially escalating the nuclear crisis.
A North Korean foreign ministry spokesman quoted by the official KCNA news agency in Pyongyang dismissed the just-concluded six-party negotiations in Beijing as a trick designed to disarm the North. The spokesman said such negotiations were of no use to the Communist state.
"The talks have made us believe that we have no other choice but to strengthen our nuclear deterrent force as a self-defensive means," the spokesman was quoted as saying. "We are not interested at all in this kind of talks and do not have any hopes," for continuing the negotiations, he said.
The comments were echoed by an unidentified member of North Korea's glum-faced negotiating team who told reporters as he left the Chinese capital that the talks were a failure. "We're not longer interested," he said.
It was not immediately clear if the statements were meant to reflect a formal change in policy by Pyongyang or were an attempt to increase its leverage ahead of the next negotiations. Pyongyang regularly issues barbed statements and vows to inflict harsh punishments on its enemies, but it often does not deliver on its threats.
North Korea discovered in the six-party talks that it had no allies willing to take its side against pressure from the United States to dismantle its nuclear program, Bush administration officials and Asian diplomats said after the talks ended. Analysts said the North may have decided that it has nothing to gain by extending the dialogue, or may simply be seeking to change the venue, the format, or the negotiating partners in the next round, which China declared would be held by October.
Pyongyang's diplomats also made provocative threats during the talks. Kim Yong-Il, the country¹s chief representative at the discussions, said his country had nuclear weapons and may stage a nuclear test to prove that they work if the United States did not offer it a nonaggression treaty.
The United States has ruled out offering North Korea a nonaggression treaty until it verifiably dismantles its nuclear program.
Bush administration officials said that if North Korea were to stage a nuclear test, the United States would move quickly to impose international sanctions and would begin interdicting North Korean ships at sea, among other measures. It is not clear what the administration would do if North Korea formally dropped out of multilateral negotiations.
Even if today's statement turns out to be more posturing rather than a rejection of the diplomatic process, it raises fresh questions about North Korea's once tight relationship with China, its largest aid donor and trading partner and the only country that has successfully mediated its relations with the United States.
At the conclusion of negotiations Friday, North Korea joined the United States, China, South Korea, Japan and Russia in pledging to hold another round of six-party negotiations within two months and to refrain from taking any provocative steps to escalate the situation in the meantime.
China announced the agreement amid some fanfare, and Beijing's state-controlled newspapers trumpeted the arrangement for new talks as a sign that China's efforts to bring about a diplomatic solution had borne fruit.
North Korea's quick disavowal "is a major slap in the face to China," said a leading political analyst here, who noted that Beijing would have been certain to make sure North Korea supported the text of Friday's announcement before issuing it.
Chinese foreign policy experts say that Beijing treated the talks as a test of North Korea's sincerity in seeking a peaceful solution to the nuclear problem. Beijing has been lobbying hard to keep the United States for pursuing more aggressive actions against the North while diplomatic channels remain open.
Shi Yinhong, an international affairs expert at People's University in Beijing, said it was too early to tell how China will react, especially given Pyongyang¹s long history of using "fierce language." But he added that China has economic tools to bring pressure on Pyongyang and may consider using them if the country backs away from the talks.
"If it turns out that North Korea wants to destroy the talks, then China may stop taking soft steps," he said. Chinese officials made no comment on the North Korean statement today.
Japan's chief negotiator at the talks, Mitoji Yamanaka, was quoted as saying by the Kyodo news agency that he expected the talks to continue despite the North's comments.
"The meeting was the first round on the nuclear problem, and I believe a movement in the direction of denuclearization clearly emerged," he said on his arrival in Japan.
nytimes.com |
