Bush's comments on N. Korea upset Asian peace plans
Published Friday, March 9, 2001, in the San Jose Mercury News
BY MICHAEL ZIELENZIGER
Mercury News Tokyo Bureau
TOKYO -- President Bush's first summit meeting with an Asian head of state generated waves of controversy and apprehension across South Korea on Thursday.
South Korean President Kim Dae Jung, who was visiting Washington, clashed with Bush on how to end North Korea's missile threat and defrost the isolated communist nation's icy relations with both Seoul and Washington.
The disagreement with Bush appeared to have damaged Kim's popularity at home and set back his efforts to negotiate an end to the 51-year-old war on the Korean Peninsula.
Bush's public doubts about North Korea's intentions, and by implication about Kim's ``sunshine policy'' of engaging the North, threaten to undermine one of America's closest and most reliable allies in the region. That could unsettle relations with Japan and China, both of which have been promoting a rapprochement between the Koreas.
``America has thrown cold water over the whole North-South rapprochement,'' said Kim Jong Wan, a professor at the
Sejong Institute near Seoul. The South Korean president is ``in a very difficult situation, and I don't see how he can go forward without taking into account some of the views and misgivings expressed by the U.S.,'' the professor said. ``The American government has reined him in.''
While many observers of North Korea share the doubts raised by Bush, many found the public display of disagreement with a close ally unsettling.
In Washington, Kim defended his position Thursday, stressing that South Korea was demanding ``verification measures every step of the way to ensure North Korea is living up to its promises.'' South Korea also expects the North to promise not to attack, to live up to past agreements and to halt its development and sales of missiles.
Bush told Kim on Wednesday that he would not immediately resume arms negotiations with North Korea. The United States first wanted to verify that North Korea had stopped developing and selling weapons of mass destruction, Bush said.
Thursday, Kim argued in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, that North Korea was changing for the better after a summit last June between the Korean leaders.
``We must not lose this opportunity,'' Kim said. ``We must assist so that North Korea can continue on the path of change. We must help so that it does not return to its old ways. . . . I truly believe it is our responsibility and duty to seize this opportunity we have for peace.''
Kim also made the case that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il was ready to settle differences with the United States.
North Korea ``has stopped slandering us and provoking us militarily, and has been forthcoming about South-North exchanges and cooperation,'' Kim Dae Jung said.
``I am aware that some read the changes on the part of North Korea as being merely temporary or tactical,'' he said, but even if they were, ``for North Korea, change is not a matter of choice but of survival. Without opening and reform to bring in outside assistance, it will be difficult for North Korea to overcome its economic difficulties.''
He characterized North Korean leader Kim Jong Il as ``bright'' and completely in charge, but added: ``This is not to tell you to trust him or that I trust him.''
Kim Dae Jung had hoped to win Bush's endorsement of his view that North Korea wants to end its years of isolation and to be led toward gradually opening to the outside world. South Korea has provided economic assistance to the famine-ravaged North, and Kim wanted to encourage Bush to finalize a deal with North Korea, initiated by former President Clinton, to halt Pyongyang's development of long-range missiles.
But BUSH WANTS TO BUILD A NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE-SYSTEM to protect America against ``rogue nations'' such as North Korea. He told Kim he did not believe that the North Koreans could be expected to live up to their word, and that verifying their promises would be difficult.
Secretary of State Colin Powell suggested Thursday that Bush might seek to include North Korea's ``huge army poised on the demilitarized zone, pointing south,'' in any future negotiations. North Korea's conventional forces were never discussed in the Clinton administration's negotiations with Pyongyang.
Powell told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the United States planned to engage with North Korea ``at a time and place of our own choosing.'' But many analysts warned that the opportunity to test the North's intentions might be brief.
Several Democratic senators expressed dismay at Bush's decision not to resume missile talks with North Korea immediately, saying they worried about the impact in Northeast Asia. ``I have a sense that we may be sending messages that are also subject to misinterpretation,'' Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., told Powell.
Some Koreans wondered whether Bush had blundered in his first summit meeting with an Asian leader, since his statements at a joint news conference diverged markedly from the communique the leaders issued. Others suggested that disagreements between Washington and Seoul might not be as deep as they first appeared.
Mercury News Washington Bureau reporters Warren P. Strobel and Renee Schoof and wire services contributed to this report.
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Contact Michael Zielenziger at mzielenziger@krwashington.com. |
