Word: pyongyang
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After a recent speech in Washington, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill was asked which was harder: negotiating with Pyongyang or trying to forge a coherent North Korea policy within the Bush Administration. Hill laughed, but it was no joke. More than five years and one North Korean nuclear test after George W. Bush said he "loathed" Kim Jong Il, the U.S. stance toward Pyongyang has now flip-flopped. No longer is Washington trying to isolate the dictator's rogue regime. Instead, on March 5 and 6 Hill held talks with the North's Vice Foreign Minister...
...since Bill Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright flew to Pyongyang and offered a champagne toast to Kim has Washington's embrace of his regime been tighter. The cranked-up diplomacy was set in motion by the recent breakthrough in the six-party talks aimed at getting the North to end its nuclear-weapons program. Last month, North Korea struck a deal with the U.S., South Korea, China, Japan and Russia to shut down its Yongbyon reactor, which produces the plutonium material necessary to make nukes, in return for a variety of economic and diplomatic benefits, including an emergency...
...even if all goes well, those steps will lead to the vexing question of whether the North is engaged in another nuclear-weapons program-one not addressed by the agreement-that involves processing highly enriched uranium, not plutonium, to make bombs. The U.S. confronted Pyongyang in 2002 with intelligence it claimed to have about the program, and according to U.S. diplomats at the time, Pyongyang confirmed it did indeed exist. Since then, the North has denied it has such a program-and now even Washington appears less certain. Last week, Joseph DeTrani, a key intelligence official, stunned a Senate panel...
...Hard-liners who had pushed for the isolation of North Korea pounced, suggesting the Administration was downplaying the uranium program to smooth the way for talks with the North. However, Hill said that while the U.S. lacks hard evidence, it intends to press Pyongyang for "complete clarity" on the program. Indeed, rather than lightening up on the North, U.S. Treasury Department officials appear poised to issue permanent sanctions against Banco Delta Asia, the Macau bank where about $24 million in assets allegedly belonging to North Korean officials have been frozen on grounds that the money is linked to illicit North...
...some point, presumably, those steps will raise the increasingly puzzling question of the North's other nuclear program, the one that allegedly makes bombs out of highly enriched uranium rather than plutonium. When the U.S. confronted Pyongyang in late 2002 with intelligence about this program, U.S. diplomats say Pyongyang confirmed its existence and then stormed out of the talks. Since then, the North has denied the existence of a uranium bomb program. And last week, a key intelligence official in Washington stunned a Senate panel by testifying that analysts now only had a "mid-confidence level" about the program...