China is promising to send a delegation to Pyongyang this month, but has also asked the White House not to issue any scary statements in the meantime. Bush has avoided mentioning the stories about Kim's nuclear sales that recently appeared in the press.
Our diplomats say that China was "surprised by the quality of the scientific evidence" about North Korea's nuclear efforts. "Until now, the Chinese, at least in public, had dismissed American charges that North Korea had a secret nuclear program to build weapons from uranium, based on technology it obtained from A.Q. Khan [current Time covery boy], the Pakistani nuclear scientist."
Hu actually took the meeting with Green and another midlevel American bureaucrat, which is "highly unusual," because of their low standing on the food chain.
In the second piece ("Bush Bites His Tongue," by Nicholas D. Kristof, NYT, 9 Feb 05, pulled off site), Kristof makes his own comparison to Nixon going to China, stating his opinion that connectivity will do most to undermine the regime quickly, along the lines of the embryonic economic connectivity both China and South Korea are producing with the Hermit Kingdom
Rumsfeld is visiting China this year...
washtimes.com
Something in the pipe?
Derek |
