New Mexico Gov. meets N. Korean diplomats amid N. Korea's conciliatory gestures

By Hwang Doo-hyong

WASHINGTON, Aug. 19 (Yonhap) -- North Korea demanded Wednesday that the United States engage in a bilateral dialogue for a breakthrough in the stalled six-party nuclear negotiations, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said.

Minister Kim Myong-gil, a diplomat with the North's mission to the United Nations
in New York, met with Richardson in Santa Fe to deliver the demand, said the
governor, who has visited Pyongyang several times in the past decades as a
troubleshooter. In the 1990s, he successfully negotiated the release of two
American citizens held in North Korea.
"They're sending signals that they're ready to resume a dialogue," Richardson
said in an interview with MSNBC soon after his three-hour meeting with Kim and
another diplomat, Paek Jong-ho, at his mansion in Santa Fe. "I'm not negotiating,
but they are telling me things that they are prepared to do. And I'm going to
pass them on."
Despite U.S. assertions that Richardson was acting independently of the Obama
administration, the meeting drew attention as it follows the landmark visit to
Pyongyang by former President Bill Clinton early this month to win the release of
two American journalists detained for illegally entering the North on a reporting
tour.
Clinton met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il for three hours in Pyongyang and
Tuesday briefed Obama on his Pyongyang trip. The North Korean leader reportedly
proposed to improve bilateral ties.
"The North Koreans clearly feel that they're owed something, that they released
the two Americans and that they want a gesture in return," the governor said. "I
do see a possible thaw. Let's take advantage of this thaw, and the next step
should be some kind of dialogue that involves the United States and North Korea."
Richardson expressed hope that a compromise will be made with North Korea, which
has shunned the six-party talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan
and Russia.
"Now the North Koreans are not accepting that now, but, you know, there's
negotiation and bargaining and diplomacy that has to take place," he said.
He said he also discussed renewable energy with the North Korean diplomats,
saying the North Koreans will "visit some renewable energy facilities, meet with
some executives here."
However, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said the department knows nothing
about the substance of the meeting, which was unofficial.
"For this specific instance, I'm not aware of any contact with this office,"
Kelly said, expressing skepticism over the meeting.
"We want them to return to the six-party context and sit down with us and the
other four partners in the six-party talks to continue talks towards the
denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula," he said. "I would discourage you from
seeing this as some kind of sign of that."
Kelly said that the department had issued a permit for the North Korea diplomats'
travel to Santa Fe, saying, "It was approved, and I understand that they did go
out to New Mexico."
North Korean diplomats in New York are required to get permission from the State
Department to travel outside a 25-mile radius around New York.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs buttressed Kelly's remarks.
"I think one of the messages that we've had and others have had, in dealing with
the North Koreans, is their belief that a nuclear weapons program will raise
their international stature, rather than -- it's our strong belief that that
program, in defiance of the agreements that they've signed, diminishes them and
further alienates them from the world," he said. "We are certainly hopeful that
whatever signals they may or may not send, that that leads them back to the
process of living up to the responsibilities that they entered into."
The bilateral ties of the Cold War foes, who fought a war in 1950-53, have
chilled as the international community imposed an arms embargo and financial and
other sanctions on the North for its nuclear and missile tests in recent months.
In another conciliatory gesture, Kim Jong-il met with Hyun Jung-eun, chairwoman
of South Korea's Hyundai Group, a major investor in the North, Sunday and allowed
the resumption of cross-border tour projects and reunions of families separated
from the Korean War.
North Korea also said it is sending a delegation to Seoul Sunday for the funeral
of former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, with whom Kim Jong-il had an
unprecedented inter-Korean summit in 2000 to produce rapprochement measures.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Tuesday said that the debriefing was useful,
and reiterated that North Korea must return to the six-party talks on ending its
nuclear programs. She dismissed Pyongyang's call on Washington to engage the
North bilaterally apart from the six-party forum.
"The briefing that my husband and those who traveled with him have provided to us
is extremely helpful because it gives us a window into what's going on in North
Korea," she said. "Our policy remains the same."
Analysts say the ailing North Korean leader may aim to use the visits by Clinton
and the South Korean business leader as a turning point for a breakthrough in the
stalled talks over the North's nuclear ambitions. Months of provocations by
Pyongyang are seen as an attempt to facilitate an unprecedented third generation
power transition to Kim's son Jong-un, 26.
Philip Crowley, assistant secretary of state for public affairs, said Monday,
"One might infer that North Korea is feeling some pressure, whether it's
political pressure, economic pressure or a combination of the two ... These
marginal steps in and of themselves are not enough."