February 13, 2007
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February 13, 2007 |
Tong Kim
As of this writing another round of the six-party talks is underway in Beijing with high expectations of a positive outcome. Optimism is largely based on the public perception of the chief U.S. negotiator Christopher Hill's recent bilateral meeting with his North Korean counterpart Kim Gae-gwan in Berlin and an encouraging atmosphere during the first day of the talks. There are clear signs that the North Koreans are more serious since a shift in the U.S. approach to bilateral engagement has taken place, still within the setting of six-party talks. Despite the lingering skepticism about a comprehensive resolution of the BDA (Banco Delta Asia) issue, optimism holds that a new breakthrough is possible at the talks at the dismantlement of North Korea's nuclear program. A partial solution, or even the prospects of a partial solution to financial sanctions, may temporarily satisfy the North Korean requirements for moving forward. An ``early harvest'' or initial actions would include a freeze on the 5-mega-watt reactor at Yongpyun and an ensuing international inspection of the freeze in return for the provision of alternative energy for North Korea. The downside of this step, though necessary, is that it looks too much like a return to the defunct Agreed Framework, which the Bush administration discarded as a bad agreement. The North Korean negotiating position seems to have been strengthened after its nuclear test and a transformed political environment in Washington. Now North Korea is not only demanding a return to the Agreed Framework with a renewed U.S. endorsement for the construction of light water reactors, but it is also pressing for a complete lifting of the financial and economic sanctions and for removing its name from the U.S. list of states sponsoring terrorism. Nevertheless the current round of talks could reach an agreement on a general road map for implementing other elements of the 9/19 joint statement, such as assurance of regime security for the DPRK, working for a peace mechanism to end the Korean armistice, and for a discussion of the steps of normalizing relations with the United States. Whatever outcome this round may produce, there will remain a fundamental problem in the ultimate dismantlement of all North Korean nuclear programs, including a suspected uranium enrichment program. The problem is a mutual lack of trust and confidence. Without building mutual confidence, there will be no complete resolution to the issue. No participant in the talks, other than North Korea, is ready to accept an incomplete solution that would allow North Korea to keep the weapons it has already developed but stop producing more weapons. The North Korean negotiator Kim Gae Gawn has recently shed light on the steps and the phases that the DPRK would go through toward the end state of negotiations. He expounded on two likely phases. In the first phase North Korea would suspend production of plutonium and/or developing weapons from it and possibly dismantle production facilities. But the second phase comes only when it is convinced of a non-hostile policy from the United States, and only then would it undertake a process of abandoning fissile material and the actual nuclear weapons. There are ways for Washington to show that it has no hostile policy toward Pyongyang. But it is impossible for the Bush administration or even for its succeeding administration not to have a hostile attitude to the persistent North Korean policy on proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and its ``bad behaviors,'' including suspected illicit international activities. A summit meeting between North Korea and the United States would be the surest way of building confidence on the part of the North Korean leadership. Kim Jong-il would be thrilled to meet with President Bush. But it is not going to happen, certainly not before and may be not even after Kim has completely given up his nuclear weapons. President Bush seems to have been caught in a dilemma between his strong moral stance against the tyrannical nature of the North Korean regime and his pragmatic political needs to address the nuclear issue. So the challenge for Washington is how it can persuade Pyongyang to believe that the United States is willing to ``coexist with North Korea,'' despite its disapproval of the North Korean governing system and how it can convince Kim Jong-il that it is really in his interest to get rid of his nuclear weapons and nuclear programs. This challenge opens up an opportunity to intensify Track II diplomacy between the two protagonists _ North Korea and the United States _ in this long saga of nuclear confrontation and negotiation. Pyongyang keeps a list of Americans, whom it wants to talk to from time to time to find out the true intentions of the American government and through whom they want to send their messages to Washington. The North Koreans invite these people to Pyongyang, especially when Track I diplomacy is dormant. The Bush administration did not seem in the past to appreciate Tract II channels, through which the North Koreans often tried to get a message to the American side that they wanted to be engaged by the United States. Long before their nuclear test the North Koreans demonstrated their nuclear capability to press for meetings with Washington _ by showing plutonium to a visiting group of private Americans including a leading nuclear physicist. Only last week on the eve of resuming the current round, Pyongyang invited another nuclear expert and a former State Department official to tell the world through them that they would freeze their main operating reactor at Yongpyun, ``if the United States abandons its hostile policy, lifts its financial sanctions and normalizes its relations with North Korea'' as proof of non-U.S. hostile policy. By definition, Track II involves informal intermediaries who are represented by private citizens including experts, former government officials and representatives of non-government organizations. But for North Korea where all institutional functions are tightly controlled by the state, Track II diplomacy is limited to discussions and exchanges of views between those Americans other than the Track I members of the administration and the officials of the North Korean government or its related agencies. Track II people can actually contribute to enhancing or reinforcing mutual understanding between those who are engaged in conducting Track I diplomacy on both sides. More importantly their mediation effort could lead to building mutual confidence on the part of their respective leadership, when supported by genuine progress that may be made in Track I diplomacy. In my own experience, I learned more about the North Koreans from Track II interactions and informal social functions than from rigid official meetings of negotiation. Through Track II diplomacy, we can learn more about the sources of their thinking and behavior coming from history, traditional cultural values and political thought. Track II diplomacy, if represented by prominent heavyweights, can serve as a useful confidence-building measure. It can also help the U.S. administration read what is really on North Korea's mind. On the other hand, diplomatic interactions with the outside world have always been a learning experience for North Korea. The North Koreans need more exposure to the outside world. Track II can support and compliment the Track I efforts toward the successful outcome of nuclear negotiation. It is high time to intensify Track II diplomacy. What's your take? Tong Kim is former senior interpreter at the U.S. State Department and now a research professor at Korea University and a visiting scholar at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS).
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