TOKYO/BEIJING, 19 January 2003 — North Korea’s ambassador to China said yesterday the standoff with the United States over Pyongyang’s nuclear program could be solved through dialogue if Washington pledged not to invade, Japan’s Kyodo News agency reported. Ambassador Choe Jin Su said in an interview two other conditions were that Washington recognized North Korean sovereignty and did not impede the North’s economic development, Kyodo News said in a report from Beijing.
Choe avoided commenting on a deal with North Korea reportedly announced by a senior US official on Friday, indicating only that Pyongyang was studying the proposal, the agency said. US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage has said that Washington may issue a non-aggression policy statement with North Korea if Pyongyang gives up its program.
In an interview with Japanese journalists in Washington on Friday, Armitage denied that the US Congress would pass any treaty of non-aggression. But he said the United States may issue a statement promising to secure the regime of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, and reiterated Washington wants to resolve the nuclear standoff peacefully through diplomacy, not war.
"We have recently spoken out that we have no hostile intentions," Armitage was quoted by Kyodo News as telling Japanese journalists. "We are not going to invade North Korea. We believe that there is a way to document this, whether an exchange of letters or official statement, something like that," he said. "If we respect their sovereignty, and their economic activity, then, there is a basis to move forward," he said.
A UN envoy returning from North Korea yesterday warned of a "serious and ominous" risk the nuclear crisis could escalate. Maurice Strong, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s special envoy who arrived in Beijing after a four-day mission to the hermit state, said things might get worse unless the two sides started trusting each other. "There is a serious and ominous risk that this crisis could escalate," he told reporters. "If it does, it would escalate ... unnecessarily, because the positions of the parties as they have articulated them are actually quite close to each other."
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov yesterday began talks with North Korean counterpart Kang Sok Ju in Pyongyang to find ways to defuse the nuclear crisis, a news agency report said. The Russian news agency Itar-Tass said the special envoy of Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Kang immediately after arriving in the capital of the Stalinist state. During his stay until Tuesday morning, Losyukov will also meet with Kim Jong Il, Itar-Tass said.
Losyukov is expected to present the North with a "package plan" put forward by Moscow to resolve the nuclear standoff with the United States. (Agencies)