U.S. still mulling bilateral high-level talks with N. Korea: White House

By Hwang Doo-hyong
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 (Yonhap) -- The United States will hold a high-level bilateral
dialogue with North Korea if the North shows signs of sincerity in its
denuclearization, a senior White House official said Friday.

"There has not been a decision yet about when and how that will happen," Jeffrey
Bader, senior director for East Asian affairs at the National Security Council,
told a forum at the Brookings Institution. "We want to see genuine signs that
North Koreans understand the six-party process is the right framework and that
denuclearization is the agenda, that the 2005 agreement remains binding ... If we
see that, there is no problem with bilateral contacts either in Pyongyang or
elsewhere."
The remarks come a day after Stephen Bosworth, U.S. special representative for
North Korea policy, said Thursday that he expects the U.S. government will "soon"
make a decision on his trip to Pyongyang, possibly "within a few weeks."
Reports have said that the U.S. point man on North Korea will fly to Pyongyang
late this year or early next year to attempt a breakthrough in the six-party
talks, deadlocked over U.N. sanctions for Pyongyang's nuclear and missile tests.
After months of provocations, North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in August
indirectly extended an invitation to Bosworth and recently agreed to return to
the six-party talks pending the outcome of bilateral talks with the U.S.
U.S. officials see the North's recent conciliatory overtures as the result of
international financial sanctions and an overall arms embargo, which they said
effectively cut off revenues from arms sales, the only source of hard currency
for the impoverished communist state.
Bader sees the North's recent conciliatory gesture as traditional brinkmanship.
"Once the cycle of provocations was completed, North Korea sat back to wait for a
newer package of concessions from the U.S.," he said. "In close cooperation with
out partners, we have passed a U.N. Security Council resolution to impose new
sanctions on North Korea. But more importantly, we have implemented it. The
result has been to make it significantly difficult for North Korea to conduct
financial transactions to support its weapons of mass destruction programs."
The White House official reiterated Washington's position to engage directly with
North Korea, but added, "We are not interested in talks for talks' sake ... We
are not interested in buying Yongbyon for a third time. We are not interested in
endorsing North Korea's dream of validation of a self-claimed nuclear power."
The North's nuclear facilities in Yongbyon, north of its capital, Pyongyang, had
been frozen and dismantled under previous nuclear agreements for the past couple
of decades or so, but Pyongyang began reactivating them recently in anger over
the international sanctions.
Bader expressed "a high level of satisfaction with how we are doing with the
Chinese on North Korea."
China, the host of the six-party talks since their inception in 2003, is the
staunchest ally and the biggest benefactor of the isolated and impoverished North
and is seen as the chief influence on its communist neighbor.
"The consultations with the Chinese over North Korea are extremely intensive and
in depth," he said. "President Obama made several phone calls to President Hu
(Jintao). If you did a pie chart on how much time was spent on these issues,
North Korea would dominate."
China has been supportive of implementing U.N. sanctions on North Korea, he said.
"I have no doubt the Chinese are serious when they say they will not tolerate
nuclear North Korea any longer. That is their strategic objective. They
understand how damaging it is to their own strategic interests and their
relations with surrounding countries."
hdh@yna.co.kr
(END)