Obama advised to send special envoy to Pyongyang on nuclear issue

By Hwang Doo-hyong
WASHINGTON, Nov. 20 (Yonhap) -- U.S. President-elect Barack Obama was advised to send a special envoy to North Korea within 100 days of his inauguration to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, a progressive U.S. think tank has recommended.
"During the first 100 days of the new administration, the president should send a
special presidential envoy to Pyongyang to deliver a simple message," the Center
for American Progress Action Fund said in a policy recommendation book titled
"Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President."
"The envoy should make it clear that the efforts of the Bush administration in
2008 to resolve the standoff over North Korea's nuclear weapons program through
the so-called Six Party process involving all of North Korea's neighbors, as well
as the direct bilateral talks the outgoing administration finally engaged in, are
still on track," said the think tank, headed by John Podesta, head of Obama's
presidential transition team who was White House chief of staff under the Bill
Clinton administration.
The policy recommendation is in line with Obama's campaign pledge that he will
meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il without any conditions attached.
Obama has dismissed criticism of the idea for his meeting with the reclusive
North Korean leader, saying Bush's reluctance to deal directly with North Korea
resulted in the North's nuclear armament.
Reports and analysts have said Obama will likely send a prominent figure as his
special envoy to Pyongyang soon after his inauguration on Jan. 20 to prepare for
a possible visit there himself to make a breakthrough in the on-and-off
multilateral nuclear talks that began in 2003.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak Sunday supported Obama's meeting with North
Korean leader Kim to persuade the North to abandon its nuclear ambitions, saying,
"It would be better for President-elect Obama to meet with Chairman Kim Jong-il
personally if it is helpful to North Korea's abandonment of its nuclear weapons."
The blueprint called for the incoming administration to "make clear to the North
Koreans that further development and improvement of the relationship between
North Korea and the United States is high on the new administration's agenda, and
that the new administration's core objective is to make further progress on the
nuclear issue."
The presidential envoy should let North Koreans know that "direct, high-level
bilateral talks between the two governments is a modus operandi acceptable to the
new administration," the blueprint said, noting such a move needs to be made in
close consultation with other members of six-party talks, involving the two
Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia.
The think tank's recommendation is in line with a policy plan released recently
by the U.S. presidential transition team.
The Obama-Biden Plan posted in the Web site of the transition team says that
"Obama and Biden will pursue tough, direct diplomacy without preconditions with
all nations, friend and foes, and they will do the careful preparation necessary,
but will signal that America is ready to come to the table and is willing to
lead."
The plan also suggested that the Obama administration will "use tough diplomacy
-- backed by real incentives and real pressures -- to prevent Iran from
acquiring nuclear weapons and to eliminate fully and verifiably North Korea's
nuclear weapons program."
hdh@yna.co.kr
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