Word: yongbyon
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...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 delivery of 50,000 tons of fuel oil. The Bush Administration's goal is not only a North Korea without nuclear weapons, but also a wholesale thaw...
...ambitious target, given the complexities of the nuclear issue alone. The six-party agreement calls for a carefully scripted process just to get the North to suspend activity at Yongbyon, which must be verified by U.N. inspectors. If that's achieved, the foreign ministers of the six nations will convene in Beijing to talk about the next stage: enticing the North to dismantle Yongbyon, rather than just idling it temporarily. In an interview with TIME, Hill says this week's talks included "extensive discussions [about] the next phase, which includes disabling the reactor" at Yongbyon, and he added that further...
...roadblock. According to Japan's Foreign Ministry, Pyongyang temporarily suspended negotiations after Tokyo demanded that it account for Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea in the 1970s and '80s. Considering how tricky talking to the North can be, just achieving the immediate goal-the shutdown and dismantlement of the Yongbyon reactor-would be a significant diplomatic feat. And as Hill is the first to acknowledge, it's a long way from here to there...
...talks are] really an effort to address broad problems in the overall region, of which denuclearization is but one," Hill said, setting the goal as a general thaw in tensions in northeast Asia. The Six-Party agreement prescribes a step-by-step process to verifiably shut down Yongbyon, before the parties reconvene in Beijing to discuss further steps that would include dismantling the reactor. Hill acknowledges that progress towards a grand bargain depends entirely on small steps over the next few months. "It is unlikely that the North Koreans will roll out of bed in the morning...
After almost five years and virtually no progress towards the stabilization of the Korean Peninsula, the Six Party talks seem to have resulted, after just a few months, in the shutdown of the nuclear plant in Yongbyon. But, perhaps more importantly, this agreement was effected through the joint efforts of the U.S. and China. This agreement represents an incremental and preliminary change, to be sure, but a promising...