Obama, Aso agree to work closely to remove N. Korea's nuke, missiles

(ATTN: ADDS more details, COMBINES story slugged US-NK-missile launch)
By Hwang Doo-hyong
WASHINGTON, Feb. 24 (Yonhap) -- U.S. President Barack Obama and Japanese Prime
Minister Taro Aso pledged Tuesday to work closely to rid North Korea of its
nuclear program through the six-party talks and deal with North Korea's missile
threats.
"With respect to regional issues, they pledged to work closely through the
six-party process to verifiably eliminate North Korea's nuclear program and to
deal with the problem of North Korea's missiles, as well as other matters,
including Japan's abducted citizens," the White House said in a statement
released soon after a summit meeting between the two leaders.
Aso is the first foreign head of state to be invited to the White House since
Obama was inaugurated late last month in an apparent gesture by Obama to focus on
the dismantlement of North Korea's nuclear and missile threats, one of key
security issues not only for the U.S. but also for Japan due to its proximity to
North Korea, which still harbors bitterness over Japan's past colonial rule of
the Korean Peninsula.
Obama is expected to have his first summit meeting with South Korean President
Lee Myung-bak in April in London on the sidelines of the G20 economic summit to
discuss North Korea, the economic crisis and other issues of mutual concern.
North Korea earlier in the day announced that it was preparing to launch a
communications satellite, without elaborating on the timing of the launch.
South Korean officials have said that the launch could take place within weeks,
in time for the parliamentary election in March. In April, it is expected that
North Korean leader Kim Jong-il will be reestablished as the chairman of the
National Defense Commission, with the possible announcement of his third son,
Jong-un, as heir apparent.
Reports have said that the recent shakeup of the North's military, including the
replacement of the defense minister, could be linked to a move to establish the
third son as successor in the wake of the North Korean leader's apparent health
failure from a stroke last summer.
In a related move, State Department spokesman Robert Wood Tuesday repeated a
warning for North Korea to refrain from launching either a long-range missile or
a satellite into orbit, saying any such activities would violate a United Nations
resolution.
"As you know, U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718 prohibits the North from
engaging in ballistic-missile-related activities, and whether it's a
space-launched vehicle or a missile, some of the building blocks for developing a
space-launched vehicle and for producing long-range missiles are similar," Wood
said in a daily news briefing.
The spokesman urged the North not to issue provocative words but to return to the
six-party talks on ending its nuclear weapons programs.
"Intimidation and threats are not helpful to try to bring about regional
stability. So the North needs to desist from that type of behavior," Wood said.
"The North needs to focus on denuclearization, living up to its commitments that
it made as part of the six-party framework, and then go from there."
The North's announcement of an imminent satellite launch is the latest of a
series of threats escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula, timed with the
arrival of the Barack Obama administration late last month.
Pyongyang has threatened to cut off all military and political ties with South
Korea, nullify a western sea border and possibly go to war with the conservative
Lee Myung-bak government. Unlike his predecessors, who have provided generous
rice, fertilizer and energy aid to the North regardless of its nuclear and
missile programs, Lee has adopted a hard line.
Obama is still formulating his North Korea policy, but supports the six-party
talks, stalled in December when the North balked at a verification protocol for
its nuclear facilities.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in Seoul last week that the Obama
administration will reward the North with diplomatic recognition, the
establishment of a peace regime to replace a fragile armistice, and provide hefty
economic assistance if the North abandons its nuclear programs under the
multilateral talks that includes the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and
Russia.
She also announced in Seoul the appointment of Stephen Bosworth as the U.S.
special representative for North Korea, overseeing the six-party talks and other
North Korea issues, dispelling concerns that the new U.S. administration is
sidelining North Korea due to a more urgent issues such as the deepening economic
crisis and the Middle East.
hdh@yna.co.kr
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