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US nuclear envoy heads for DPRK in bid to save deal
(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-10-01 09:56 US nuclear envoy Christopher Hill embarked on a mission to rescue an unraveling disarmament deal with Pyongyang, traveling to the region Tuesday as part of a rare trip to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). Hill's visit to the DPRK, set to begin today, could determine the fate of the disarmament-for-aid pact that Pyongyang has been flouting with a series of moves to reassemble its Yongbyon nuclear facilities. "Let's see if we can make some progress," Hill told reporters upon arrival in the Republic of Korea (ROK) en route to the DPRK.
Hill was scheduled to hold talks with ROK officials Tuesday afternoon. The diplomat plans to enter the DPRK through the heavily fortified Demilitarized Zone this morning, according to a person familiar with Hill's travel plans. He asked not to be named, saying he was not authorized to discuss the trip with media. Since mid-August, DPRK authorities have taken steps to restore its Yongbyon facility, citing anger over Washington's refusal to grant Pyongyang a promised reward - removal from the US terrorism blacklist. The United States says the DPRK first should accept a plan to verify its accounting of past nuclear activities - a demand Pyongyang has rejected as an attempt to unilaterally disarm it. Hill said his trip will focus on settling the verification row. "I know they (the DPRK) are reluctant," Hill said. "Let's see what they say. Let's sit down and have a conversation and see if we can resolve this matter." In New York, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters on Monday that DPRK officials extended Hill an invitation to come to their capital, Pyongyang, "so we hope that there is some effort to address the verification protocol because that's what we need". Rice said the US "will look to see what they have to say". US State Department spokesman Robert Wood said in Washington that Hill is traveling to the DPRK "to encourage them, once again, to submit this verification package, which we've said is not an onerous task that we have asked the DPRK to undertake". He called it a "standard verification package" that has been carried out by other countries. Wood did not have details of when Hill would be in DPRK or with whom he would meet. His DPRK counterpart is Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan. The spokesman said Hill would also go to China and Japan for talks. It would be Hill's third visit to the DPRK, with the earlier visits made in June and December last year. The DPRK agreed in Feb 2007 in talks with the United States, Japan, China, Russia and the Republic of Korea to disable the Yongbyon facilities in exchange for economic aid and political concessions, including removal from the terrorism list - a long-coveted goal of Pyongyang. The DPRK began disabling its facilities in November and in June blew up a cooling tower in a display of its determination to carry out the process. But the deal ran aground in late July when Washington delayed the DPRK's removal from the terrorism list until it agreed to verification. Pyongyang protested, saying verification was never part of the pact, and stopped disabling the plant in mid-August. Last week, the government ordered UN nuclear monitors to leave the country, saying it would reinsert nuclear material into the reprocessing facility. Experts say scientists could have the plant up and running within months. Agencies |
