 US wants Korean reconciliation before talksWashington (AFP) Sept 9, 2010 - The United States said Thursday that it wanted North and South Korea to ease soaring tensions before negotiations resume on ending Pyongyang's nuclear disarmament drive. "We believe that it will be critical for there to be some element of reconciliation between the North and South for any process to move forward," said Kurt Campbell, the US assistant secretary of state for East Asia. "We have communicated that very clearly to all parties involved," he said at a forum at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think-tank. Campbell said the United States was in "deep consultations" on the next step forward. Stephen Bosworth, the US pointman on North Korea, is due in Asia next week for talks. US-allied South Korea has been uneasy about Chinese-backed calls to resume six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear drive, saying that its communist neighbor first needs to demonstrate its seriousness. South Korea and the United States say that North Korea torpedoed a South Korean naval ship in March, killing 46 people in one of the peninsula's deadliest incidents in decades. South Korea and the United States have called on the North to admit responsibility and apologize, although it has been unclear whether they consider it an unnegotiable condition for talks. The US diplomatic push comes as North Korea's ruling party holds a rare meeting, which many analysts believe will anoint ailing leader Kim Jong-Il's youngest son Kim Jong-Un as the 68-year-old's successor. Campbell said he had no inside information on the meeting. "In truth, we have really no indication one way or the other and we are watching like others in Asia," he said. China opposes S.Korean sanctions against IranBeijing (AFP) Sept 9, 2010 - China on Thursday expressed its opposition to additional sanctions imposed by South Korea on Iran over its disputed nuclear programme, repeating its call for more talks to resolve the standoff. "We don't approve of unilateral sanctions on Iran," foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told reporters, echoing statements made when the United States and the European Union slapped Tehran with punitive measures. "We hope relevant parties can stick to the direction of diplomatic resolution and seek an effective resolution through dialogue and negotiations." Following a fourth round of UN Security Council sanctions in June, South Korea has joined the United States, the EU, Australia, Canada and Japan in taking unilateral measures to check Iran's nuclear ambitions. Seoul said Wednesday it would penalise a key Iranian bank and put all financial transactions with the Islamic republic under strict government supervision as part of sanctions over its controversial nuclear programme. The South will impose a "heavy penalty" on the Seoul branch of Bank Mellat, which allegedly facilitated hundreds of millions of dollars in transactions for Iranian nuclear, missile and defence entities, the foreign ministry said. Ministry spokesman Kim Young-Sun did not elaborate but Yonhap news agency said the bank would likely face a two-month suspension. The United States hailed the sanctions move as increasing pressure on Tehran to return to the negotiating table to address concerns about its nuclear aims. China -- which backed the latest UN sanctions against Tehran for refusing to freeze its uranium enrichment -- has emerged as Iran's closest trading partner and has major energy interests in the Islamic republic. |
South Korea's point man on North Korea warned Thursday of a global "nuclear domino effect" unless the communist state scraps its atomic weapons. Unification Minister Hyun In-Taek was speaking days before senior US officials travel to South Korea, Japan and China for talks on the issue.
North Korea's atomic armament meant "major changes" in the region's security environment as well as the international order, Hyun, whose ministry handles cross-border relations, told a forum.
"It will produce nuclear domino effects across the globe," he said.
"Its nuclear programme is only pushing the North closer to a crisis," the minister added, saying that Pyongyang's weapons ambitions had "aggravated regime instability" and the impoverished country's economic woes.
The North bolted six-party nuclear disarmament negotiations in April last year following a United Nations reprimand for a long-range rocket test. It staged an atomic weapons test -- its second -- a month later.
China, which hosts the six-party forum that also including the two Koreas, the United States, Japan and Russia, is pushing to revive the dialogue.
But inter-Korean tensions remain high after the South accused the North of a deadly submarine attack on one of its warships.
At a separate event, the US military commander in South Korea said that the incident showed the North would focus on "asymmetric warfare" in any future provocations.
"We take the threat very seriously, what they will do in the future," General Walter Sharp, who commands 28,500 US troops in the country, told local reporters.
Given the strength of South Korean and US troops in a conventional all-out conflict, North Korea is "putting more money" into special operations forces, missile technology and nuclear weapons, Yonhap news agency quoted him as saying.
Sharp said annual US-South Korean war games staged last month practised a scenario that included stabilising the North following any conflict.
The computer-simulated exercise was based on lessons the US has learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, he was quoted as saying.
North Korea has reacted angrily in the past to such war planning, saying its real aim is forcible regime change.
The US envoy for North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, plus Sung Kim, the US special envoy for the six-party talks, and Daniel Russell, the National Security Council's Asia director, will make a three-country regional trip starting Sunday.
They will visit Seoul on September 12-14, Tokyo on September 14-15 and Beijing on September 15-16 as part of a flurry of recent consultations on the nuclear issue.
North Korea has reportedly finished preparing for a landmark meeting of its ruling communist party, and there is speculation it will confirm the youngest son of leader Kim Jong-Il as his eventual successor.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Wednesday the United States was watching for any leadership changes but hoped that whoever is in power will scrap nuclear weapons.
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