New Mexico Governor Arrives For Talks With North Korea

WASHINGTON — Governor Richardson, a Democratic candidate vying to become America's first Hispanic president, arrived in North Korea yesterday for talks with the "axis of evil" country — with the apparent blessing of the Bush administration.

The approving official reaction of the White House, which lambasted the speaker of the House, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, for visiting Syria's president, Bashar Al-Assad, last week, says much about the new attitude toward Pyongyang since the six-country deal in February. To the chagrin of American hawks, President Bush signed an agreement in which North Korea pledged to shut down a key nuclear facility and allow the return of U.N. nuclear inspectors in return for about 55,000 tons of heavy fuel oil.

China, Russia, Japan, and South Korea joined America in reaching the accommodation with Kim Jong Il's Stalinist regime.

But Pyongyang was given 60 days to fulfill its promises — a period that ends next Saturday — and has made little apparent progress in doing so. Mr. Richardson, who is the governor of New Mexico, was ambassador to the United Nations under President Clinton and is a former congressman. Last week, he announced that he had raised $6 million for his presidential campaign, placing him fourth in the Democratic stakes.

Although unlikely to challenge the Democratic front-runners, Senators Clinton and Obama, Mr. Richardson, 59, is widely seen as a potential vice-presidential candidate because of his foreign-policy credentials and his appeal to Latino voters.

Mr. Richardson said he would not discuss nuclear matters and that his four-day visit was to discuss the return of the remains of American soldiers killed in the Korean war — a highly emotive subject in America. But he is being accompanied on his trip, his sixth to Pyongyang, by Victor Cha, Mr. Bush's top adviser on North Korea.

Mr. Richardson said the visit was an important sign of goodwill toward the communist country. "It could be the signal of an improved relationship. The North Koreans always consider protocol very important. They like to be considered a major power in the region."

Mr. Bush identified Iran, North Korea, and Saddam Hussein's Iraq as members of an "axis of evil" in his State of the Union speech just over five years ago. But he has since moved away from a policy of isolating Pyongyang.

His critics, including John Bolton, a former American ambassador to the United Nations, and Elliot Abrams, a senior White House adviser on Middle East matters, accuse him of capitulation to nuclear threats.