Word: agreement
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...Recall that back in February, Kim's government agreed, during the so-called six-party talks, to shutter its Yongbyon nuclear plant within 60 days of signing what was then billed as a breakthrough agreement. In return, the North would get a variety of economic and diplomatic benefits. After several years of fruitless talks, this seemed like a major diplomatic victory for the Bush Administration and its partners - Japan, South Korea, Russia and China. But Kim delayed moving on Yongbyon until the North got back more than $20 million that had been frozen in a Macau bank account - funds...
...said that it was the "first time" North Korea had put such a timetable on its commitment to stand down its entire nuclear program. (And indeed, precisely when the North would get rid of its entire nuclear program - not just the Yongbyon reactor - was not specified in the February agreement...
...annual list of state sponsors of terrorism. It's a goal the North has long sought, and not just for face-saving reasons: membership on the list, alongside nations such as Iran and Syria, denies North Korea access to economic benefits like low-interest World Bank loans. The February agreement had held out the possibility of such a deal if Pyongyang followed through with denuclearization. But was it true? Hill, arriving in Sydney on Tuesday for the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, flatly denied the U.S. had made such a bargain. "No, they haven't been taken...
...North is already getting some of the economic aid it was promised under the original agreement, so Kim may feel he has some room to pressure the U.S. over the terrorist sponsorship list. And the U.S.'s ability to push back may be limited. Much of the fuel and food aid Pyongyang is now getting comes from South Korea and China. South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun has no incentive to anger Kim now that the two have agreed to a summit in Pyongyang in October. And the Chinese, in this their glorious Olympic year, have already pocketed the idea...
...part, the Bush Administration has clearly made the calculation that getting a verifiable agreement on the North's nuclear program is worth pretty much any diplomatic price. In this it may actually be right, assuming the North finally gets beyond Groundhog Day, tells the world exactly what it has, and then gets rid of it. That would be a serious diplomatic achievement. But we're not there yet. And that's why, sometime in the next few months, Washington might quietly strike North Korea off the State Department's list of terror-sponsoring states - and then cross its fingers...