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Jiang, Putin take aim at N. Korean nukes
BEIJING, China -- China and Russia have made a joint call for North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons program, urging Pyongyang and Washington to normalize diplomatic relations. In a wide-ranging statement issued Monday in Beijing, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Jiang Zemin urged the two sides to work for a peaceful resolution of the nuclear issue. "The sides consider it important for the destiny of the world and security in Northeast Asia to preserve the non-nuclear status of the Korean peninsula and the regime of non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," the joint declaration said. The statement came after the two leaders held more than an hour of talks Monday morning, focusing on a range of foreign policy concerns, including North Korea, and the future of relations between the two giant neighbors. Focusing on other issues, the statement called for a peaceful settlement in Iraq and a declaration of mutual support for each other's struggle with Muslim separatists. Putin's three-day visit to Beijing is designed to firm-up a partnership between the two countries as well as give the Russian president a chance to get to know China's new, younger generation of leaders appointed at the recent Communist Party congress. During his stay he is scheduled to hold talks with the new party chief, Hu Jintao -- the man tipped to take over the presidency early in 2003 -- as well as signing a series of agreements on bilateral cooperation in the fields of energy, trade and technology. Defense cooperation will also be high up on the list of priorities with Putin keen to ensure China continues to maintain its recent high level of spending on Russian military hardware. Common interestOn top of that, both sides are seeing the Russian leader's visit as a chance for the two countries to build on areas of common interest, particularly their shared desire to contain American domination in world affairs. "We hope the leaders in our two countries will work hard together to achieve great things," Putin said after his meeting with Jiang. "The relationship between our two countries has reached a very high level," he added. By far the greatest concern however was directed at the North Korean issue -- a country which has close ties with Russia and China, but which takes orders from no-one. Last month North Korean said that a 1994 agreement with the United States had collapsed following Washington's decision to suspend fuel oil shipments to the isolated Stalinist country. The fuel was being provided in return for the North's commitment to shut down nuclear facilities capable of producing weapons-grade material. In October, however, North Korean officials told a visiting U.S. delegation that they had continued to maintain an active weapons program, although it is unclear whether North Korea has yet produced a working nuclear bomb. That admission, according to Washington, effectively nullified the deal.
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The sides consider it important for the destiny of the world and security in Northeast Asia to preserve the non-nuclear status of the Korean peninsula 
