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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (65733)	1/12/2003 11:53:54 PM
From: Sig	Respond to of 281500

Re Oil Imports from Iraq washingtonpost.com FWIW Sig

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (65733)	1/13/2003 12:41:30 AM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Carl, every day that Iraqi oil is off the markets is another hugely profitable day for USA oil companies. So, there's no real hurry to get the oil on the market. Maurice, the part of the US economy that consumes oil is lots bigger than the part that produces oil. Gas prices have already started to rise here because of Venezuala.

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (65733)	1/13/2003 1:24:18 AM
From: greenspirit	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

This article was written by a South Korean pundit. Diplomacy: What Is Next? search.hankooki.com By Choi Yearn-hong The South Korean policy toward North Korea has proven to be questionable to date. Kim Dae-jung’s ``sunshine’’ policy has earned him a Nobel Peace Prize _ but for what? I do not see any resulting peace as a result of his policy, and in fact, his policy has ignited ``peace against war’’ tension across the border. Peace cannot be a response to war. The 1994 Agreed Framework can be good only when both sides work together faithfully. However, they have not done so. President Bush placed North Korea in the ``axis of evil,’’ and North Korea secretly developed its nuclear weapons program, despite U.S.-supplied crude oil. The South Korean government is trying to persuade China and Russia to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear ambition. I strongly believe two states can forcefully persuade North Korea to drop its nuclear weapons program. However, I believe China and Russia have been babying North Korea and not forcing any decisive change. I don’t think they are playing an adequate role for world peace. The South Korean government has been trying to persuade the United States to take a diplomatic approach to North Korea as well. That attempt is working. Secretary of State Colin Powell is seeking diplomatic solutions and has opined that the present situation is an impasse and not a crisis that can be resolved through negotiation. There are two groups in the Bush administration: one group prefers diplomacy, and the other confrontation. President Bush has declared that there will be no negotiations with North Korea until it gives up its nuclear weapons program. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld stated the U.S. could get involved in two possible wars _ Iraq and North Korea. Finally, President Bush accepts ``talk, not negotiation’’ with North Korea. Good grief. The South Korean government’s dream is to change North Korean policy including its nuclear weapons program, but nothing has happened. North Korea is threatening to withdraw from the NPT. It is going to develop more nuclear bombs if the U.S. is distracted with a possible Iraq war. The U.S. may not strike Pyongyang, while engaged in a war with Iraq. Bush chose diplomacy, not confrontation with North Korea. The U.S. seemingly does not have any forceful policy, because South Korea’s capital is too close to the DMZ. If a U.S. preemptive strike cannot destroy the Yongbyun nuclear facility and DMZ forts simultaneously, the U.S. may follow South Korea’s policy in offering endless money and materials. That will be pathetic. The South Koreans are scared of a possible North Korean retaliation if the U.S. were to strike the Yongbyun nuclear facilities. There should not be any retaliation. Diplomacy is preferred to confrontation. What is next? Diplomacy should contain a regime change in North Korea. It may be an impossible task. But it is the only way to bring peace to the Korean peninsula. The engagement policy with North Korea to date has not gone as planned. It did not change the regime in North Korea, and does not look like it will change it. The U.S. and South Korea should abandon the appeasement policy with North Korea. That is the best policy for dealing with this repressive regime. Regime change is a prerequisite for the engagement policy. North Korean people are starving, wandering across Manchuria for food, and seeking routes to South Korea, while risking their lives. There is no such a thing as human rights in North Korea. A moral argument can be made for a regime change in North Korea, which brutalizes its own citizens. In the absence of a strategy for a regime change, diplomacy with such an odious regime might be another one of the world’s evils. If a strategy of a regime change is smart and tough, it might even produce some results. North Korea wants no sanctions. The U.S. thinks sanctions will not change anything in North Korea, because it is an isolated country, and China and Russia will back up Kim Jong-il. That is why I cannot understand the North Korean statement saying sanctions against it would be a declaration of war. Kim Jong-il reluctantly accepted foreign trade as his survival tactic. Kim does not even allow letter exchanges between the families separated by the Demilitarized Zone. North Koreans are isolated to Kim’s prison or ``animal farm.’’ He himself is an isolationist. Once he equates sanctions with war, he must open the nation and free the North Korean people. Should I say that is a positive statement? However, I don’t like to hear that South Korea is an easy target of North Korea’s war. Seoul is too close to North Korean artillery. North Korea takes advantage of South Korea, knowing the South does not want war at all. Why does the South Korean regime fear the North’s threat or war? The South Korean regime has been willingly making South Korea a hostage to North Korea’s threat. I don’t like it. The South should confront the North eye-to-eye. I hope North Korea does not humiliate South Korea. Whenever the North confronts the U.S., it threatens the South. That is not fair at all, because South Korea has sent the North an astronomical amount of money and humanitarian aid in the name of love. At the present time, North Korea provokes the U.S. The South Korean regime has done everything it can do. North Korea should not abuse South Korea any more. I am angry. ^We should offer a Nobel peace prize to those who can design a regime change strategy for North Korea.

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (65733)	1/13/2003 1:41:35 AM
From: greenspirit	Respond to of 281500

This report was written yesterday in the Korean Herald. North's silent victims 11 Jan 2003 koreaherald.co.kr Amidst North Korea's continued standoff with the outside world over its suspected nuclear arms program, the communist state's 22 million residents are reportedly having a severe winter with scant food and energy. International aid agencies say they are "profoundly concerned" about famine that will hit the already starving population of the reclusive country within a couple of months. Millions of people are feared to perish in the year ahead without additional donations from the international community, according to aid workers. Latest reports on the food situation in the North paint dismal pictures of a population silently suffering under a repressive regime that has failed in economic and agricultural policies. The U.N. World Food Program says it had to curtail distribution to some three million residents, leaving them dependent on government rations that meet only half of minimum nutritional requirements. A greater misery is that food has grown even harder to obtain and inflation has skyrocketed since last summer's economic reform measures. Statistics more vividly describe the heart-wrenching reality in the country that has few other international economic activities than missile exports to fellow "rogue states." An official report by the North Korean government in 2000 said 45 percent of children five years old or younger suffered from chronic malnutrition. An earlier survey by the WFP, UNICEF and the European Union found 62 percent of children six months to seven years old to be showing symptoms of stunted growth, 15 percent acutely undernourished and 30 percent suffering anemia. Appealing for revived international attention on North Korea's critical food shortages, the WFP said earlier this week that about 80,000 tons of grain is needed immediately to avert starvation. The U.N. agency said it would need at least 512,000 tons of grain worth $201 million for this year, of which less than $15 million has been pledged to date. Donor governments have grown increasingly reluctant to continue their aid for the North, due to poor access to the sites of delivery and the competing urgency of assistance to other regions including Afghanistan and African countries. It is a remarkable relief that, amid signs of dialogue opening between Washington and Pyongyang, a U.N. envoy is now visiting the North to assess the need for humanitarian aid in the isolated country. The United States, which has been the most generous donor since the mid-1990s, has withheld the approval of grain shipments due to continued obstacles by the North to the monitoring of aid distribution. So has Japan cut off its food aid after North Korea acknowledged last year that it had abducted Japanese citizens during the Cold War. The European Union offered a welcome donation of $9.86 million on Wednesday to make up for the recent cutbacks in assistance from Washington and Tokyo. The money will reportedly be used to buy and distribute 39,000 tons of cereals for "the most vulnerable, especially children and mothers of newborn babies." Despite the growing public skepticism about its engagement policy in the wake of the North's nuclear threats, the South Korean government will ship next week the final portion of its promised aid of 400,000 tons of rice for last year. The incoming administration of President Roh Moo-hyun would be wise to use its aid to the North for better leverage, if not immediate reciprocity, in improving inter-Korean relations. It is evident that the South should bear a greater share of the help its northern neighbor needs to survive, when it aspires to have greater influence on the Korean peace process. On his part, Kim Jong-il must place foremost priority on feeding the North Korean people if he hopes to steer the nation away from a nightmarish future.