Looking For A Deal This Time?

The United States and North Korea may be reassessing their deadlock

By Thomas Omestad

Posted Sunday, February 4, 2007

Like any good diplomat, Christopher Hill knows how to dampen expectations before sitting down to hash out a deal. But more than most envoys, Hill, the top U.S. negotiator in talks resuming in Beijing this week over North Korea's nuclear weapons programs, has ample reason to let some skepticism show.

Fifty-two frustrating months into a confrontation with North Korea over its nuclear weapons programs, the six-nation talks established to rein in Pyongyang's atomic breakout have, so far, netted nothing. Nothing, that is, except neglected promises on paper. In that time, North Korea has tested ballistic missiles and an atomic bomb, declared itself a nuclear power, and multiplied its supply of plutonium from enough for one or two bombs to as many as 13-with most estimates now suggesting six to eight.

Even advocates for negotiations increasingly suspect that, despite its decision to rejoin talks, the North has made a strategic choice to stick with nuclear weapons as the ultimate deterrent to any effort to dislodge Asia's most secretive and anti-American regime. Time, it seems, has been working against Hill and others seeking a deal: With Pyongyang's nuclear buildup and its seeming judgment that the administration is tied down by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il may believe that he can wait out President Bush and gain global acquiescence to the North's nuclear status. The U.S. bargaining position, says Gary Samore, director of studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, is "really much weaker."

But it is not just the North's prickly intransigence that has made Hill's task look titanic. Policy struggles within the administration have led to fits of incoherence-or simply straitjacketed U.S. officials assigned to bargain with the North. The lines of battle have pitted hawks, who publicly back the negotiations with the communist North but privately see them as a dead end, against those who favor engagement. "We had warfare going on the entire time I was there," recalls David Straub, a former Korea policy aide who resigned from the State Department last year.

A window on these debates opened last month after the resignation of John Bolton, a key hard-liner who served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. "Six-party talks have not worked," Bolton said in Tokyo. "Over time," he declared, "the only answer to the North Korean nuclear weapons program is the collapse of the regime." Despite repeated professions of support for a diplomatic approach, Bush himself has shown ambivalence at times about dickering with a dictatorship. He jettisoned the Clinton-era outreach to the North and did not conceal his personal antipathy toward Kim.

As the diplomatic stalemate wore on, hawks found a tool with unexpected capacity to reach out and hurt Kim's regime: a crackdown on money laundering, counterfeiting of U.S. dollars, and other illicit, money-making trade. The administration announced sanctions on a Macao bank alleged to be laundering money for North Korea. That happened just before Hill and envoys from South Korea, Japan, China, Russia-and North Korea-inked a joint statement on principles for nuclear disarmament in return for security assurances, normalization of relations, and economic and energy aid.


Sledgehammer. Under U.S. pressure, Macao authorities subsequently forced Banco Delta Asia to freeze some $24 million in North Korean accounts. Though the amount seemed inconsequential, the U.S. sanctions prompted banks in China and Vietnam to close accounts or refuse to deal with North Korea. Treasury 's action had the effect of discouraging even legal commerce with the North-enraging Pyongyang, which boycotted nuclear talks for more than a year. "The U.S. found a ball-peen hammer," says Charles Pritchard, a former U.S. official who negotiated with the North. "When they struck it, it sounded like a sledgehammer to the North Koreans." Pyongyang's response, Robert Joseph, the departing under secretary of state for arms control and international security, told U.S. News last fall, "does, I believe, demonstrate the vulnerability of the regime. It's more than a defensive reaction."

As Hill, an assistant secretary of state, met last month with North Korean diplomats and hopscotched across Asia and Europe to restart the nuclear talks, the internal policy skirmishes flared up again. U.S. diplomats moved to block U.N. development aid to North Korea on the grounds that the funds could be diverted to the Kim regime. The State Department said the action reflected an ongoing drive for U.N. reforms and the U.N.'s own schedule for making spending decisions. But other officials worried that the action could provoke Pyongyang at a sensitive moment and saw instead, as one put it, "an effort to undermine" Hill.

Earlier in January, U.S. News has learned, a State Department official at a meeting in Paris suggested seeking a travel ban on the very North Korean diplomats who negotiate with Hill. Another official at State denied the report, and a senior U.S. policymaker said no such effort is underway. Still, the audacity of suggesting such a travel ban prompted Indiana Sen. Richard Lugar last week to complain of actions that could "subvert" Hill's efforts and to demand an explanation. Says Donald Zagoria, who has organized gatherings with North Korean officials for the National Committee on American Foreign Policy in New York, "I am flabbergasted at the brazenness with which some are trying to undercut the process."

Despite the hurdles at home, current and former administration officials say, Hill now has a greater degree of "running room"-the flexibility, for example, to conduct three days of initially secret bilateral meetings in Berlin with North Korean officials last month. "The president and Secretary [Condoleezza] Rice have told Hill to get a deal," one former senior official tells U.S. News. Adds a serving official, "He's been given a mandate."

Gestures. Other developments point to some movement on the nuclear front. Treasury officials last week conducted unprecedented, detailed talks with North Korean finance counterparts, reviewing nearly 50 North Korean-related accounts at Banco Delta Asia. One objective appears to be identifying accounts that are not part of illegal activities, setting the stage for their unfreezing. A senior U.S. official tells U.S. News that North Korea has dropped its demand to lift the financial sanctions before it negotiates on the nuclear question, saying, "They've walked back."

More broadly, the Berlin meetings delved into practical ideas for implementing the September 2005 agreement; it was, says one official, a "freewheeling dialogue" that was used to "shake some things loose." South Korean officials have hinted at both U.S. and North Korean concessions. Initial steps might include a North Korean freeze on its plutonium-producing Yongbyon reactor and the return of U.N. nuclear inspectors-as the financial squeeze is eased and some benefits, likely energy supplies, begin to flow. Doubts remain, however, that North Korea may be mostly intent on deflecting international pressure. A senior U.S. official says the "sense of urgency" this time exceeds past rounds of talks. But there is also a studied lack of optimism. "No one's confident at all."

Whatever the outcome in Beijing, the sense in Washington is that Bush badly needs a foreign policy "win," and North Korea could be it. "Rice has been given a legacy charge. The clock is ticking," says Pritchard. And patience with the six-party saga is waning. Without toutable progress soon, it just may snap.

USNews.com: The United States and North Korea Might Be Reassessing Their Nuclear Deadlock

核完全放棄を確約させよ ６カ国協議

　北朝鮮の核開発問題をめぐる６カ国協議が、８日から北京で開かれる。

　これに先立ち、米朝両国は１月、６カ国協議代表がベルリンで、金融問題専門家が北京でそれぞれ話し合った。

　昨年１２月、１年１カ月ぶりに再開された６カ国協議では、北朝鮮が米国による金融制裁の解除を主張して譲らず、核問題の交渉には入れなかった。

　今回の６カ国協議は、米朝直接対話を踏まえた上での開催となる。米朝間の協議での具体的な合意内容は明らかにされていないが、米首席代表のヒル国務次官補は「協議を進展させる基盤はできた」と一定の成果を強調した。

　直接対話を拒んできた米国の歩み寄りが、金融制裁解除に固執する北朝鮮の態度を軟化させ、核放棄に向けた実質的な協議が進展することを期待したい。

　ただ、これまでの経緯を見る限り、決して楽観はできない。

　２００５年９月の「６カ国協議共同声明」で、北朝鮮はすべての核兵器と既存の核計画を放棄し、核拡散防止条約（ＮＰＴ）への復帰と国際原子力機関（ＩＡＥＡ）の査察受け入れを約束した。

　それにもかかわらず、昨年７月に弾道ミサイルを連続発射し、同１０月には核実験を実施した。

　先の米朝協議で、北朝鮮は金融制裁解除とエネルギー支援を前提条件に、寧辺の原子炉の稼働停止と査察を受け入れる用意があることを示唆したとされる。

　だが今回も、譲歩するふりをしながら、最大限の成果を引き出そうという、北朝鮮得意の戦術ではないかとの疑念は捨てきれない。

　６カ国協議の目的はあくまでも北朝鮮の核完全放棄である。核施設を一時的に凍結しても、再稼働が可能であれば意味はない。核開発再開が後の外交駆け引きの材料とされるのは目に見えている。

　最初の一歩として「凍結」はあり得るが、その後の完全廃棄を確実にする具体的な工程表とセットでなければ受け入れることはできない。インドやパキスタンのように、北朝鮮がなし崩し的に核保有国となってしまうことだけは何としても阻止しなければならない。

　金正日独裁体制の打倒を掲げた米国のブッシュ政権は、イラク政策の失敗で大敗した中間選挙後、柔軟路線に転じつつある。軍事力を背景にした強硬路線一辺倒を軌道修正し、直接対話の回路を開いたことは評価できる。

　しかし、外交での小さな「成果」を求めるあまり、譲歩を重ねて北朝鮮のペースにはまってはならない。

　北朝鮮が協議の場に出てくるのは、国際社会による経済制裁措置が効果を上げている証拠だ。

　この包囲網にほころびが生じないよう連携を強化しつつ、非核化というゴールに向けて着実に網を絞っていくしか、今のところ有効な手だてはない。

＝2007/02/05付 西日本新聞朝刊＝議

[核完全放棄を確約させよ　６カ国協議] / 社説 / 西日本新聞

エネルギー支援を議論へ＝6カ国協議「3日間で十分」－中国外務次官

　【北京5日時事】北朝鮮の核問題をめぐる6カ国協議で議長を務める武大偉中国外務次官は5日、北京訪問中の野田毅元自治相（日中協会会長）と会談し、再開される6カ国協議では北朝鮮へのエネルギー支援が議論されることを明らかにした。協議の日程については「おそらく3日間で十分だ」との見通しを示した。
　武次官は6カ国協議で朝鮮半島の非核化を第一目標としたが、「（米朝・日朝という）関係各国間の正常化もあるし、北東アジアの安全と平和のメカニズムも検討したい」と語った。日本が求める拉致問題解決については「協力したい」との考えを示し

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