“Foreign diplomatic sources” have told Fox News that Chris Hill has floated the idea of accepting a declaration that omits information about North Korea’s proliferation — to Syria, for instance – or its suspected uranium enrichment programs.
With North Korea almost a month overdue on its obligation to provide a complete and correct declaration of all its nuclear programs and materiel, the Bush administration — under increasing pressure from American conservatives to take a harder line with Pyongyang, or abandon the talks altogether — is now considering accepting a declaration that would be less than complete, carving out the two most contentious issues for later resolution, sources told FOX News.
The foreign diplomatic sources, representing countries involved in the six-party nuclear disarmament talks with North Korea — a group of nations that includes the U.S., Russia, China, Japan, and South Korea — told FOX News that the U.S. envoy to the talks, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, has floated the idea of allowing the North Koreans to exclude from their declaration both their highly enriched uranium (HEU) program and their nuclear collaboration with Syria, with the understanding that these issues would be revisited later. [Fox News]
Not to worry. Barack Obama will demand and get straight answers from the North Koreans next year. Just you watch.
The North Koreans are telling Hill that Agreed Framework v2.0, v2.1, and v2.2 don’t require it to declare its proliferation, and actually, that’s true (but not true of its uranium enrichment program). Strictly speaking, North Korea isn’t required to declare its completed nuclear weapons, either. These are just a few of the ginormous loopholes in this irreparably flawed deal. The declaration Hill may now be ready to accept would be pretty much the same thing he rejected in November, then lied about later.
For what it’s worth — not much in my book — Chris Hill denies this. Still, it’s very hard to imagine the White House trying this, given hardening conservative opposition to this deal. With all of the inconsistent statements eminating from our Unification Ministry State Department recently, it’s hard to tell who speaks for us. The problem is that Chris Hill is the only one there, he’s putting as little as possible in writing, and we can’t exactly trust him.
