U.S. to have bilateral talks with N. Korea to resume 6-way process: State Dept.

By Hwang Doo-hyong
WASHINGTON, Sept. 11 (Yonhap) -- The United States Friday said it will soon
undertake bilateral negotiations with North Korea to persuade Pyongyang to return
to the stalled six-party talks on its denuclearization.

"We are prepared to enter into a bilateral discussion with North Korea ... and
it's designed to convince North Korea to come back to the six-party process and
to take affirmative steps towards denuclearization," said Philip Crowley,
assistant secretary of state for public affairs. "If a bilateral discussion can
lead us back to a six-party process, we think that is a legitimate means to a
desirable end."
The move is seen as an attempt to revive the six-nation negotiations, deadlocked
over international sanctions on North Korea after the North's nuclear and missile
tests earlier this year.
North Korea has said it will boycott the multilateral talks for good, complaining
they have been used to infringe upon its sovereign right to develop nuclear and
space technology.
Pyongyang has demanded Washington deal with it bilaterally for a breakthrough,
while Washington insisted on resolving the dispute through the six-party process
also involving South Korea, China, Japan and Russia.
Crowley would not describe the impending two-way meetings with the North as a
policy shift by the U.S.
"And just to be clear, any discussion that we would have with North Korea will be
in the context of the six-party process," the spokesman said. "The purpose of
that discussion will be to try to convince North Korea to return, you know, to a
multilateral process, and, more specifically, to go back to its obligations in
its agreement in 2005 to denuclearize."
The six-party agreement, signed in September 2005, calls for North Korea's
nuclear dismantlement in return for massive energy and economic aid,
normalization of ties with Washington and Tokyo and the establishment of a
permanent peace regime to replace the fragile armistice that ended the 1950-53
Korean War.
Crowley said that details of a bilateral dialogue will be decided soon.
"Given the consultations that we have, given the invitation that was extended,
we'll make some decisions, you know, in the next couple of weeks," he said.
Crowley was referring to the invitation extended to Stephen Bosworth, U.S.
special representative for North Korea policy, by North Korea last month when
former U.S. President Bill Clinton flew to Pyongyang. Clinton met with North
Korean leader Kim Jong-il and won the release of two American journalists held
there for months for illegal entry.
Reports said that other parties to the six-way talks have already agreed that
Washington should have a bilateral dialogue with Pyongyang as part of the
six-party process to promote resumption of the multilateral talks.
Winding up a weeklong Asian trip, Bosworth said in Tokyo Tuesday that Washington
will soon decide how to respond to North Korea's demand for bilateral talks.
"As we have indicated in the past, the United States is willing to engage with
North Korea on a bilateral basis, and we are currently considering how best to
respond to a North Korean invitation for bilateral talks," he said. "We have not
reached a decision on how to respond to this invitation, and we will be
considering that in Washington over the next few weeks."
Analysts have said that Bosworth will visit Pyongyang on his next Asia trip,
describing it as part of consultations with other six-party members, just as
Christopher Hill, the former chief U.S. nuclear negotiator, frequently did to woo
North Korea back to the table.
The decision for bilaterals comes amid criticism that North Korea is building its
nuclear arsenal for lack of active engagement by the Barack Obama administration.
Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, was often under fire for designating
Pyongyang as part of an axis of evil and then ignoring it, only to see the North
conduct a nuclear test and build several nuclear warheads.
North Korea said last week it was entering the final stages of a uranium
enrichment process, another path to making nuclear weapons. The North's
plutonium-producing reactor was to be dismantled under the six-party deal.
Crowley also did not rule out the possibility of Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton or other senior U.S. officials meeting with North Korean diplomats at the
United Nations later this month.
"I mean, obviously, you know, the U.N. General Assembly, to give you an example,
will provide an opportunity at a high level for leaders to -- you know, to talk
to the countries of the six-party process," he said. "I don't know that that'll
happen -- that might happen, you know, individually. But obviously, you know, the
president, the secretary of state, others will have the opportunity to talk to
all the countries in the six-party process. So I would point to that as being
perhaps the next step."
hdh@yna.co.kr
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