Nuclear Talks

The United States pressed North Korea to take "concrete and irreversible" steps to give up its nuclear arsenal Thursday as the two held talks on how to improve hostile relations. It was not known whether North Korea made any specific demands. Diplomats and experts have warned the North is unlikely to make concessions in the talks.

The US special envoy on North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, and the North's first vice foreign minister Kim Kye Gwan held about 4.5 hours of talks at the US mission to the United Nations.

The US State Department said the first of two days of meetings in New York had been "serious and businesslike." North Korea's representative referred to the atmosphere of the talks as "constructive and interesting."

'Words are not enough'

State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in Washington at a news briefing that "words are not enough," urging "action" on disarmament. The negotiations are "a chance for us to sound out the North Koreans" and "gauge their seriousness," the spokesman said. Washington stressed that it was closely coordinating with South Korea and other partners in talks with the reclusive North.

He added that North Korea's human rights record could also be discussed at the talks in New York, and that Washington had yet to decide on resuming food aid to North Korea, which says more than 6 million people are in urgent need of assistance. "We've made no decisions on food aid," Toner said. Washington continues to study the findings of a US team which visited North Korea in May to assess its possible food needs, he added.

In a sign of the diplomatic minefield that the United States has been navigating in its dealings with North Korea, one of Bosworth's aides was seen carrying a copy of "How Enemies Become Friends," a book by former Bill Clinton presidential adviser Charles Kupchan into the meeting. Kupchan champions the cause of US engagement with its enemies. "The absence of trust on both sides is at this point so significant that a kind of grand bargain (between the US and North Korea) is unlikely - if only because it wouldn't pass muster with domestic skeptics here in the United States, particularly on Capitol Hill," Kupchan told AFP.

He suggested that interim measures, such as North Korea allowing inspections of certain sites or Western powers giving more assistance and economic aid to the impoverished North could help "the confidence-building measures broaden into the trust needed to strike a lasting deal."

Surprise meeting

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton invited North Korea's representative to New York after a surprise meeting between nuclear envoys from North and South Korea at an Asian security forum in Bali, Indonesia last week.

Ahead of the talks in New York, the North highlighted its mistrust of US motives at a UN debate on disarmament. The North's UN Ambassador Sin Son Ho said the United States was aiming through a proposed missile defense shield to gain "absolute nuclear superiority and global hegemony over the other nuclear power rivals." He said the shield that the United States wants to build over Eastern Europe showed that the United States has no moral justifications to lecture other countries about nuclear proliferation. He warned that the shield could spark a new nuclear arms race.

First step

North Korea's official news agency, however, said in a commentary that an agreement with the United States formally ending the 1950-53 Korean War could become a "first step" to peace on the Korean peninsula and "denuclearization." North and South Korea fought a bitter war, with the US backing the South. July 27 is the 58th anniversary of the armistice that ended the fighting between North and South Korea. The two countries are still technically at war as no formal peace treaty has ever been signed.

Efforts to restart the six party talks, which took place from 2003 to 2009, until the North quit, have been hindered by two deadly border incidents last year which Seoul blames on its neighbor. The North's disclosure last November of a uranium enrichment plant is another complicating factor. Meanwhile, North Korea is preparing a rare military exercise involving its army, navy and air force that could be launched this week in the tense Yellow Sea, reports in South Korea said. A government source quoted by the South's Yonhap news agency said the North had assembled about 20 navy vessels, including landing craft, off the western port of Nampo and deployed MiG-21 fighters to Onchon Airbase in the same area. A South Korean Defense Ministry spokesman said he had no information on the reports, which had come just four days after the surprise meeting between nuclear envoys from the two Koreas.

Author: Shivani Mathur (AFP, Reuters)
Editor: Sarah Berning