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North Korea escalates nuclear crisis
The Times of India ^ | November 2 2002 | HARVEY STOCKWIN/TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Posted on 11/02/2002 11:38:32 AM PST by knighthawk

As it steps up its campaign for a treaty of non-aggression with the US, North Korea is denying that it admitted to pursuing uranium enrichment processing, justifying its pursuit of nuclear weapons, threatening national suicide, and putting all the blame on the United States for breaking treaty commitments.

These conclusions emerge from a careful reading of a lengthy statement issued by an unnamed spokesman of the North Korean Foreign Ministry on October 25th. This statement is obviously being treated as the prevailing party line, as its words are reduplicated by North Korean ambassadors overseas (see Times Of India website today, "North Korea Remains Defiant On Nuclear Option").

As most of the world sees it, the latest Korean crisis has arisen because a North Korean negotiator brazenly admitted to Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly on October 4th that Pyongyang has been violating its promises made under the 1994 Agreed Framework between North Korea and the US.

This North Korean admission came after Kelly had presented the latest US intelligence findings to the North Koreans on October 3rd which indicated that, evidently for several years, the North had been seeking uranium enrichment processes in its ongoing pursuit of nuclear weapons. The North Koreans also claimed that, in addition to the uranium enrichment programme, they have "more powerful things as well," which the Americans took to mean that they possessed other weapons of mass destruction.

The October 25th Foreign Ministry statement effectively denied this version, maintaining that "Producing no evidence, Kelly asserted that the DPRK has been actively engaged in the enriched uranium programme in pursuit of possessing nuclear weapons in violation of the Agreed Framework. He even intimidated the North Korean side by saying that there would be no dialogue with the US unless the DPRK halts the uranium enrichment, and that the DPRK-Japan and North-South Korean relations would both be jeopardised."

The North Korean account omitted two crucial aspects of the American report — the presentation of US intelligence, and the North Korean admission of their uranium enrichment programme.

Far from admitting anything, the Foreign Ministry maintains that "The US attitude was so unilateral and high-handed that the DPRK was stunned by it. The United States is seriously mistaken if it thinks such a brigandish attitude — reminding one of a thief crying 'stop the thief' — would work on the DPRK."

Again, outside North Korea, most observers noted that North Korea's continued pursuit of nuclear weapons is in violation of the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, the 1994 Agreed Framework with the US, and the 1991 joint North-South agreement on denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.

The statement insists to the contrary that it the United States which has violated all these agreements. It contends that when President George W Bush referred to North Korea as part of an axis of evil "this was a clear declaration of war against the DPRK, as it totally nullified the 1994 joint DPRK-US joint statement and Agreed Framework.......the Bush Administration has adopted as its policy to make a pre-emptive nuclear strike at the DPRK. Such moves (are) a gross violation of the basic spirit of the nonproliferation treaty, and reduce the inter-Korean joint declaration on denuclearisation to a dead document."

The Foreign Ministry further argued that since the US was breaking all its promises, North Korea was perfectly entitled to go nuclear. "The Bush Administration's reckless political, economic and military pressure is most seriously threatening the DPRK's right to existence, creating a grave situation on the Korean Peninsula. Nobody would be so naive as to think that the DPRK would sit idle under such a situation.

"That is why the DPRK made it very clear to special envoy James Kelly that the DPRK was entitled to possess not only nuclear weapons but any type of weapon more powerful than that, so as to defend its sovereignty and right to existence from the ever-growing nuclear threat by the US."

In one sense, it's the Cuban Missile Crisis all over again. At one critical point in October 1962, President John F Kennedy and his advisers had to decide whether Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev's ultra-aggressive, or his less bellicose statements, were the ones that mattered.

Conceivably the North Koreans are offering the Americans a similar choice. On the one hand, the Foreign Ministry statement stresses a North Korean acceptance of national suicide: "Nobody can match anyone ready to die. This is the faith and the will of the army and people of the DPRK, determined to remain true to the army-based policy to the last."

On the other hand, there is the almost pathetic appeal of North Korea, the failed state: "The settlement of all problems with the DPRK, a small country, should be based on removing any threat to its sovereignty and right to existence. There may be negotiations, or the use of deterrent force,..... but the DPRK wants the former (negotiations) as far as possible."

But as the North Koreans deny the American version of what actually happened in the October 3rd/4th negotiations, further US dealings with Pyongyang become even more unlikely.


TOPICS: Extended News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: commies; northkorea; nuclearcrisis; nukes

1 posted on 11/02/2002 11:38:33 AM PST by knighthawk
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To: MizSterious; rebdov; Nix 2; green lantern; BeOSUser; Brad's Gramma; dreadme; keri; Turk2; ...
Ping
2 posted on 11/02/2002 11:38:56 AM PST by knighthawk
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To: knighthawk
Strike first. Strike decisively.
3 posted on 11/02/2002 11:58:31 AM PST by RAT_Poison
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To: RAT_Poison
Methinks that a non-agression pact with North Korea reads something like, "Please Great Satan, don't destroy the nuclear weapons producing reactors you bought us."

Let's turn the B-2s loose for a little Feung-Shui action in North Korea.
4 posted on 11/02/2002 12:13:58 PM PST by SandfleaCSC
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To: knighthawk
the DPRK was entitled to possess not only nuclear weapons but any type of weapon more powerful than that

Don't let them develop the spud gun.

5 posted on 11/02/2002 12:16:50 PM PST by RightWhale
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To: knighthawk
Just how is this a "crisis"? Our existence does not hang in the balance. How we respond immediately will not determine whether Western Civilization will be destroyed. It is a "situation". It is a serious concern. It is a problem. It is not a crisis.
6 posted on 11/02/2002 12:43:46 PM PST by arthurus
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To: knighthawk
Now we are expected to believe the clintoon administration for six years never had a clue about their future intentions! The Kings Of The East are playing their cards close to the vest and playing us for the fools we are and still receive imported oil from us! I smell a BIG RAT! Oh! I'm sorry; we Americans are not supposed to think out of the box are we? Just sit by and accept this deception!
7 posted on 11/02/2002 12:58:34 PM PST by wharfrat
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To: RAT_Poison
Strike first. Strike decisively.

Try this first: stop the 500,000 tons of heavy fuel oil the US gives N Korea each year. The White House hasn't announced that move yet.

8 posted on 11/02/2002 6:02:33 PM PST by secretagent
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