North Korea threatens to exit nuclear weapons talks
Officials say the nation will fire up its nuclear plant again and go back to making plutonium. The warning is in response to the U.N. rebuke of North Korea’s recent missile launch.
Reporting from Seoul — North Korea today threatened to withdraw from the stalled six-party nuclear-disarmament talks, saying it would soon return to making arms-grade plutonium at its weapons facilities.
The announcement came in response to international outrage following a rocket launch April 5 that many said was a ruse to test-fire a long-range ballistic missile. North Korea has insisted that it launched a communications satellite into space.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea “resolutely rejects the unjust action taken by the [United Nations] wantonly infringing upon the sovereignty of the DPRK and seriously hurting the dignity of the Korean people,” said the announcement by the government-controlled Korean Central News Agency.
Quoting a statement from the Foreign Ministry, the news-agency release said North Korea “will never participate in the talks any longer nor it will be bound to any agreement of the six-party talks.”
South Korean officials said today they would not overact to the North’s proclamation.
North Korea’s response is stronger than expected, considering such strong words as “never” were used, a South Korean foreign ministry official told Yonhap news service. “The government will deal with North Korea’s threats in a calm manner.”
Northeast Asia security analysts reacted with dismay to the development, which comes after months of international pressure failed to dissuade Pyongyang from firing its rocket.
“Isn’t this what the United States expected?” asked Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korean studies expert at Dongguk University in Seoul, saying the U.S. had called for sanctions against Pyongyang.
“North Korea had said that six-party talks would break up when the issue on the rocket launch is brought [to] the table in the United Nations.”
U.S. Embassy officials in Seoul declined comment today.
Yet analysts said the statements not only ratcheted up tension on the Korean peninsula but also thrust the fledgling Obama administration deeper into a diplomatic showdown with Pyongyang.
“It’s troubling and it’s going to be difficult — they’re saying they are no longer bound by any of the agreements in the six-party talks and they’re going to reprocess all their spent fuel,” said Daniel Pinkston, northeastern Asia deputy project director for the International Crisis Group think tank.
He said the U.S. and its allies would have to determine how closely North Korea’s diplomatic drawback was connected to criticism over its rocket launch.
“Is this just a pretext, has it been their intention all along to back out of their nuclear-related commitments, or is this their reaction to developments? People will have different views, but it’s definitely not good.”
North Korea had begun to dismantle its aging Yongbyon nuclear plant as part of an agreement to receive food and other aid from countries involved in the talks, including China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the U.S.
But today’s statement said North Korean officials would soon begin “restoring to their original state the nuclear facilities which had been disabled under the agreement of the six-party talks and putting their operation on a normal track.”
Analysts said the facilities could begin running again in three months or less.
Ko said North Korean leader Kim Jong-il had little to lose with the gambit.
“I think North Korea is at a crossroads,” he said. “After a cooling-off period, there might be bilateral talks between U.S. and North Korea. For North Korea, rejoining the six-party talks can be another card to play.”
Others believe the prospect of North Korea resuming its rush toward nuclear weapons might even persuade the U.S. to consider one-on-one talks with Pyongyang, a tactic it has resisted.
The Obama administration, Pinkston said, has to “find some politically acceptable arrangement to get some constraints on their program. They have to make a sincere effort to give them some safe exit to back down, to de-escalate from here.”
Other Pyongyang watchers insisted that any U.S. response should not be a replacement for the six-party talks.
“Direct talks with the North should include an agenda to restart the six-party talks,” said Kim Sung-han, an international-relations professor at Korea University. “If the talks are a substitute for six-party talks, other powers such as China and Russia are not likely to cooperate.”
He said China will be pivotal in any international reaction.
China had been reluctant to condemn North Korea for its launch and could exert its influence to bring Kim and his regime back to the nuclear bargaining table, Kim said.
North Korea has insisted that its satellite launch was part of a “peaceful” attempt to explore space. But the U.S., Japan and South Korea sought to punish Pyongyang through a U.N. condemnation.
Today, North Korea called the move “brigandish,” adding that the U.N. Security Council had never before in its history “taken issue with satellite launches.”
