Word: korean
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
What's the world's most worrisome nuclear-proliferation hotspot? Answer: the diplomatic table in Beijing where six-party talks are periodically convened to discuss North Korean nuclear disarmament. Every time the international negotiators gather-or even threaten to gather-Pyongyang seems to take another step toward unrestrained nuclear breakout...
...dizzying climb-down. Gone are U.S. demands for the complete, verifiable, irreversible dismantlement of the North's nuclear programs. American diplomats no longer even talk of North Korea's highly enriched-uranium program, whose public exposure by State Department officials in 2002 triggered the ongoing proliferation drama. Since North Korean officials now insist they've never had such a program, it would be undiplomatic to suggest otherwise...
...Instead, the U.S. was reduced last month to promising North Korea an "early harvest" in return for good behavior. This concept called for the U.S. to pledge economic aid (food, oil) and other benefits (including, perhaps, diplomatic recognition) in return for a provisional North Korean freeze of its plutonium facilities and a readmission of nuclear inspectors. In other words, the Bush Administration was proffering a zero-penalty return to the previous nuclear deals Pyongyang had flagrantly broken-but with additional goodies, and a provisional free pass for any nukes produced since 2002. With this overture, the Bush team embraced...
...cave-in when it sees one. They brushed aside the "early harvest" proposal as inadequate, demanding still more before they would listen to new denuclearization offers-specifically, the release of $24 million of Pyongyang's funds currently frozen in Macau's Banco Delta Asia on suspicion of North Korean complicity in counterfeiting U.S. currency. Pyongyang's obsession over the past year with repocketing its Macau bag money-a paramount issue on its foreign agenda ever since the accounts were impounded in 2005 by Macau banking authorities under U.S. Treasury scrutiny-is easily explained. Since the North is in many respects...
...choosing. He understands that the six-party farce provides ideal diplomatic cover for his unobstructed nuclear buildup. What the other players don't seem to understand-or in the case of an increasingly weakened Bush presidency, may fear to face-is that the only genuine solution to the North Korean nuclear crisis is to push for a better class of dictator in Pyongyang...