N. Korea Edges Away From Nuclear Pledge

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WASHINGTON – With the ink still drying on an agreement to dismantle its nuclear program, North Korean officials yesterday indicated that they were already backing away from its terms, threatening to leave intact its “nuclear deterrent” until and unless America delivers a light-water nuclear power reactor.


A statement from the regime’s Foreign Ministry threatened that America “should not even dream of the issue of the DPRK’s dismantlement of its nuclear deterrent before providing LWRs,” adding, “This is our just and consistent stand as solid as a deeply rooted rock.”


The statement from Pyongyang came as Iranian negotiators threatened to take a page from the North Korean playbook and withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty if America, Britain, France, and Germany referred its prior violations of the treaty to the U.N. Security Council. North Korea in 2002 announced that it had been secretly enriching nuclear material and soon afterward withdrew from the treaty that technically allows nations to create fissile material so long as international inspectors deem its production to be used for peaceful purposes.


The tenuous state of negotiations with the two remaining members of what President Bush dubbed the “axis of evil” in his 2002 State of the Union address illustrate how much the White House policy on proliferation has changed.


Six months ago, Mr. Bush was calling out Kim Jong Il for starving his people, and promising that “all options were on the table” with regard to Iran’s pursuit of nuclear fuel. But this week the White House touted a bargain whereby North Korea pledged to dismantle its nuclear program in exchange for development assistance and a promise of a light-water nuclear reactor. Last Tuesday, Mr. Bush said that countries have a right “to want to have a civilian nuclear program.”


Secretary of State Rice yesterday dismissed the North Korean statement. “I think we’ll just stick with the text of the Beijing agreement to which the North Koreans signed on. And the text of the agreement says that we’ll discuss a light water reactor at an appropriate time. There were several statements afterwards that make clear what that sequence is,” she said.


Later in the day, a State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack, said that in Ms. Rice’s meeting with the Chinese foreign minister both powers agreed that November’s scheduled meeting to iron out the details of a North Korean deal would focus on the next steps Pyongyang would take to dismantle its nuclear weapons program.


“Both agreed that the next round of six-party talks should focus on issues related to the North’s dismantlement of its nuclear programs and the verification of that dismantlement,” Mr. McCormack said. China provides North Korea with the majority of its fuel and foreign aid.


The Japanese chief Cabinet spokesman yesterday expressed more concern about the statement. “We must watch North Korea closely to see if there is really a fundamental difference on that point,” Reuters quoted Hiroyuki Hosoda as saying. “If we are completely at odds, that will mean going back to the beginning. But we do not believe that is the case.”


It is notoriously difficult to anticipate North Korea’s political behavior. In the past, Kim Jong Il has reneged on his commitments. Indeed, the impetus for the current round of six-party talks was Mr. Kim’s decision to enrich secretly plutonium while he was thought to be abiding by the strictures of a 1994 agreement that also promised a light water nuclear reactor in exchange for his decision to end his nuclear arms program.


North Korea’s success in getting back into the good graces of the international community appears to have emboldened Iran. In Vienna yesterday, Iran’s top nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani said, “I remind them of the North Korean case: After two years, they accept North Korea’s right to enrichment. They should do the same with us.'”


In his statements yesterday, the Iranian envoy threatened not only to withdraw from the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, but also to begin again to enrich uranium and to stop the International Atomic Energy Agency from conducting inspections of the program it hid from the international community for more than 15 years. In July, Iran began the conversion of Uranium yellowcake into gas, the step necessary before its enrichment to nuclear fuel.


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