Changing Atmosphere

9 February 2007



North Korean Talks Progress

Sometimes, negotiations in world diplomacy make the most progress when the parties involved have exhausted themselves with intransigence. This seems to be the case in the six-party talks about the North Korean situation that opened yesterday in Beijing. For months, the US and North Korea have been sniping at one another, while the Russians, Chinese, South Koreans and Japanese have shaken their heads in frustration. Now, the North Koreans and the Americans both need a deal. As a result, the initial reports say progress has been made.

The deal, if there is one, will revive the September 2005 agreement among the parties that essentially mothballs Pyongyang’s nuke program in exchange for food and fuel as well as some security assurances. As American Secretary of State neo-Condoleezza Rice told Congress yesterday, “I am cautiously optimistic that we may be able to begin, again, to implement the joint statement of 2005 toward the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”

North Korea’s tune may not have changed, but the sociopath regime there is singing in a different key. Winter has arrived, and reports are that (as usual) the country’s domestic food production was completely inadequate. At the same time, because of the nuke test the country undertook a few months back, no aid is arriving (South Korea alone has held up 500,000 tons of food shipments), and the regime’s bank accounts abroad remain frozen. Rumor has it that President Kim Jong-il is running out of cognac, and that has focused his attention remarkably.

Of course, just as it takes two to fight, it takes at least two to make a deal. Here, the Bush administration’s general failure both domestically and internationally is actually good for the world. If he is to avoid the title of Worst American President Ever, Mr. Bush needs to be able to point to some kind of success. Having lost the World Trade Center, the Middle East and New Orleans, it’s straw-grasping time. Reining in North Korea would allow the White House to proclaim that America is safer and that another member of the axis of evil has been declawed.

This morning, the Chinese will lay out a draft agreement, and America’s chief negotiator Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill expects it will detail a “set of actions taken in a finite amount of time” for North Korea, specifying that it would cover a matter of “single-digit weeks.” South Korea’s man, Chun Yung-woo, rightly said, “Joint efforts, wisdom and flexibility from all six countries are badly needed now more than any other time.”

© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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