US, Japan in offer of talks with N. Korea
Source: Agencies |
April 15, 2013, Monday
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The United States and Japan yesterday offered new talks with North Korea to resolve the increasingly dangerous standoff over its nuclear and missile programs, but said Pyongyang must first lower tensions and honor previous agreements.
North Korea has a clear course of action available to it, and will find "ready partners" in the US if it follows through, US Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters in Tokyo.
Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, who appeared with Kerry at a news conference, was more explicit, saying North Korea must honor its commitment to earlier deals regarding its nuclear and missile programs and on returning kidnapped foreigners.
The officials agreed on the need to work toward a nuclear-free North Korea and opened the door to direct talks if certain conditions are met.
Their comments highlight the difficulty in resolving the North Korean nuclear situation in a peaceful manner, as pledged by Kerry and Chinese leaders in Beijing on Saturday.
The issue has taken on fresh urgency in recent months, given North Korea's tests of a nuclear device and intercontinental ballistic missile technology, and its increasingly brazen threats of nuclear strikes against the US.
Decades of hostility
US and South Korean officials believe North Korea may deliver another provocation in the coming days with a mid-range missile test.
Given their proximity and decades of hostility and distrust, Japan and South Korea have the most to fear from North Korea's unpredictable actions.
Kerry vowed the US would protect its Asian allies against any provocative acts, but said Washington wanted a peaceful solution to rising tensions in the region.
Kerry also sought to clarify his comments made in Beijing on Saturday, which some took to suggest he might be offering to remove recently boosted missile defense capabilities in Asia if China persuaded North Korea to abandon its atomic programs.
In recent weeks, the Pentagon have announced plans to position two Aegis guided-missile destroyers in the western Pacific and a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missile defense system on Guam.
Nothing on the table
"The president of the United States deployed some additional missile defense capacity precisely because of the threat of North Korea. And it is logical that if the threat of North Korea disappears because the peninsula denuclearizes, then obviously that threat no longer mandates that kind of posture. But there have been no agreements, no discussions, there is nothing actually on the table with respect to that," Kerry said.
Kerry's visit to Japan followed two days of meetings in South Korea and China.
Six-nation talks with North Korea collapsed more than four years ago, and Kerry said that for negotiations to resume, North Korea "needed to indicate their willingness to move toward denuclearization."
Kerry told a round-table discussion with US journalists that, under the right circumstances, he even would consider making a grand overture to North Korea's leader, such as an offer of direct talks with the US.
"We're prepared to reach out," he said.
"I'm not going to be so stuck in the mud that an opportunity to actually get something done is flagrantly wasted because of a kind of predetermined stubbornness," he said.
"You have to keep your mind open. But fundamentally, the concept is they're going to have to show some kind of good faith here so we're not going to around and around in the same-old same-old."
North Korea has a clear course of action available to it, and will find "ready partners" in the US if it follows through, US Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters in Tokyo.
Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, who appeared with Kerry at a news conference, was more explicit, saying North Korea must honor its commitment to earlier deals regarding its nuclear and missile programs and on returning kidnapped foreigners.
The officials agreed on the need to work toward a nuclear-free North Korea and opened the door to direct talks if certain conditions are met.
Their comments highlight the difficulty in resolving the North Korean nuclear situation in a peaceful manner, as pledged by Kerry and Chinese leaders in Beijing on Saturday.
The issue has taken on fresh urgency in recent months, given North Korea's tests of a nuclear device and intercontinental ballistic missile technology, and its increasingly brazen threats of nuclear strikes against the US.
Decades of hostility
US and South Korean officials believe North Korea may deliver another provocation in the coming days with a mid-range missile test.
Given their proximity and decades of hostility and distrust, Japan and South Korea have the most to fear from North Korea's unpredictable actions.
Kerry vowed the US would protect its Asian allies against any provocative acts, but said Washington wanted a peaceful solution to rising tensions in the region.
Kerry also sought to clarify his comments made in Beijing on Saturday, which some took to suggest he might be offering to remove recently boosted missile defense capabilities in Asia if China persuaded North Korea to abandon its atomic programs.
In recent weeks, the Pentagon have announced plans to position two Aegis guided-missile destroyers in the western Pacific and a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missile defense system on Guam.
Nothing on the table
"The president of the United States deployed some additional missile defense capacity precisely because of the threat of North Korea. And it is logical that if the threat of North Korea disappears because the peninsula denuclearizes, then obviously that threat no longer mandates that kind of posture. But there have been no agreements, no discussions, there is nothing actually on the table with respect to that," Kerry said.
Kerry's visit to Japan followed two days of meetings in South Korea and China.
Six-nation talks with North Korea collapsed more than four years ago, and Kerry said that for negotiations to resume, North Korea "needed to indicate their willingness to move toward denuclearization."
Kerry told a round-table discussion with US journalists that, under the right circumstances, he even would consider making a grand overture to North Korea's leader, such as an offer of direct talks with the US.
"We're prepared to reach out," he said.
"I'm not going to be so stuck in the mud that an opportunity to actually get something done is flagrantly wasted because of a kind of predetermined stubbornness," he said.
"You have to keep your mind open. But fundamentally, the concept is they're going to have to show some kind of good faith here so we're not going to around and around in the same-old same-old."
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