Bumpy road ahead for U.S.-N Korea talks

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is among those who want better ties with the United States

By Mike Chinoy
Senior Asia Correspondent

A year ago this month, a historic summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and his South Korean counterpart Kim Dae-Jung raised hopes that the last conflict of the Cold War might be nearing an end.

But those hopes -- boosted by U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright's visit to Pyongyang last October amid signs of progress towards an accord to halt the North's missile program -- faded after George W. Bush took office.

As the new administration began a wide-ranging review of U.S. Korea policy, Bush declared Pyongyang could not be trusted and froze negotiations with North Korea.

Now, the U.S. president has declared his readiness to resume dialogue.

But with the positive atmosphere of a year ago largely dissipated, the prospects for accelerated North-South rapprochement or renewed movement on missile curbs remain uncertain.

Bush's tough stance

"The North Koreans are saying 'We can't just pick up where we left off, and it's not a situation where everything that we were talking about then, that was on the table then, is exactly the way it was," said Selig S. Harrison, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation in Washington.

Harrison spoke after completing his seventh visit to North Korea earlier this month, where he met with senior officials.

Harrison said North Korean leaders still want better ties with the United States.

But he said they remain deeply suspicious of the tougher approach advocated by the Bush administration.

The North has threatened to resume missile tests and, possibly, restart a suspected nuclear weapons plant, if Washington did not prove more accommodating.

Unacceptable

Even with its call for talks, the new U.S. approach, analysts say, contains several elements that North Korea may find unacceptable.

These include pressure on Pyongyang to provide more information on its nuclear weapons program to the International Atomic Energy Agency, to reduce its conventional forces along the heavily fortified Korean Demilitarized Zone, and to accept tougher verification procedures in any future missile agreement.

Bush administration officials have justified this approach on the grounds that it is the only way to ensure Pyongyang will actually abide by any future accord.

The North Koreans, however, have their own grievances with Washington.

Under a 1994 agreement, the United States promised to build two new safer nuclear reactors, and provide annual supplies of fuel oil to help Pyongyang deal with the power shortage caused by shutting its older nuclear plants.

But due to financial problems and political tensions, the project is far behind schedule, and the broader rapprochement with the United States the North had hoped for has also not materialized.

"What they're interested in is a normalization of relations that would lead to U.S. support for North Korean membership in the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the IMF, and opening up to the international community," said Harrison.

"They want American help in operating their stagnant industrial and agricultural economy."

Warnings

In the past, the North has used bluster and threats as a standard negotiating tactic to win American concessions.

Analysts say the latest warnings about ending the missile freeze, restarting nuclear reactors that could produce weapons-grade plutonium, and insisting that it will not resume talks if Washington sets conditions, fit that pattern of behavior.

So does the North's most recent provocative action towards South Korea.

Having effectively frozen movement towards a thaw on the peninsula, and delayed a promised return visit to the South by Kim Jong Il, the North has initiated what appears to be a war of nerves by sending ships into South Korean waters over Seoul's vociferous objections.

The message seems similar to that being sent to Washington: North Korea is still capable of causing major problems if its long-time adversaries refuse to engage on Pyongyang's terms.