Posted on 03/08/2007 10:15:33 PM PST by Roy Tucker
HANOI (AP) Talks between Japan and North Korea on normalizing ties ended after just 45 minutes Thursday, leaving wide gaps as their top envoys blamed each other for the lack of agreement on key issues.
"I hope they understand the consequences," Japan's top envoy, Koichi Haraguchi, said of the North Koreans during a news conference at the end of the abbreviated two-day talks.
No further discussion is planned in Hanoi, he said. No date was immediately announced for future talks.
The first day of talks also ended abruptly Wednesday afternoon when North Korean negotiators reacted angrily to Japan's insistence that they resolve the outstanding issue of the abduction of Japanese citizens by Pyongyang before bilateral ties can improve. The North Korean delegation reportedly told Japan that further discussions on the issue would be "meaningless."
The two-day talks in Hanoi were mandated by a six-nation agreement in February, when North Korea pledged to shut down a key nuclear reactor linked to its atomic weapons program in return for energy aid and talks on improved relations with regional powers, including Japan and the United States.
Shortly after the talks ended Thursday, North Korean envoy Song Il Ho demanded Japan take the first step instead of asking his country to make concessions.
"It's time for Japan to move on," Song told reporters at the North's embassy in Hanoi.
He said North Korea cannot consider reinvestigating the abduction issue until Japan lifts sanctions against Pyongyang over the North's missile and atomic tests last year, stops "suppressing" pro-North Korean residents living in Japan, and agrees to reparations for the colonial rule.
Haraguchi urged the North Koreans to realize that the outcome of their talks with Japan would also have an impact on a six-nation deal struck last month for the North to shut down its nuclear arms program in return for aid, as well as on the North's ties with the United States.
"If they want to push forward talks with the U.S., they need to improve Japan-North Korea relations," he said.
Sorry should have been "Expect".
This is really terrific. The North Koreans in a mind-numbingly barbarous act kidnap innocent Japanese citizens in Japan and bring them back as hostages to North Korea.
The Japanese ask for the return of the hostages and the hostage-takers say first comply with our demands.
There is no moral equivalence here. The North Korean regime is criminal. This is the kind of regime the Chinese and the Russians are propping up.
In all too many political situations of the current era talk is just meaningless noise. "Negotiating" with the N. Koreans is one of those situations. The only way to deal with them is with meaningful noise.
Agree. Time to turn up the heat on the Norks.
In so many ways the N.Koreans remind me of the Democrat Party.
LOL! Good pic!
Japan could get its point across to NK very effectively by cutting off all of its aid to the socialist paradise.Then,95% of NK's population would be malnourished instead of the 70% currently.
Where have we heard that before?
www.moveon.org
Giving up discussions on state-sponsored kidnappings is a pre-condition to further talks?
There is no negotiating with these people.
It's as if hostage-takers are negotiating with the police and the police demand they release some of the hostages and the hostage-takers say, "Forget about the hostages, address our demands."
The Japanese are right to break off negotiations. Time is on our side in this case.
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