Someone Please Staple Kim Geun-Tae’s Lips Together

This is an act that damages our national pride and is not appropriate for the South Korea-U.S. alliance.”

— Kim Geun Tae, head of S. Korea’s ruling party and North Korea’s favorite
dancing piggy, on hearing that the United States actually intends
to implement U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718.

When I worried aloud that the United States would ease sanctions on North Korea during the pendency of the next round of endless, pointless six-party extortion denuclearization talks, I based my concern in part on Korean reports that turned out to be a case of wishful thinking. That thinking later turned to confusion, and finally, to the sort of bitter, infantile braying that has so effectively isolated South Korea in the latest round of diplomacy. It must have hurt that South Korea was the last to know that talks would resume. The United States, China, and North Korea met alone. Neither South Korea’s long-term benefactor nor the recipient of $7 billion of its taxpayers’ money spent the dime to call them.

What’s remarkable is that they wonder why.

Today, the United States clarified that it will implement Resolution 1718 as long as it remains in force, suggesting that it would remain in force until North Korea gave up its nukes. It also said that it expects North Korea to demonstrate that it’s serious about disarming. It did not rule out a lifting of sanctions on North Korea’s ill-gotten deposits in Banco Delta Asia, however. The Korean press reports and officials don’t seem to grasp a key distinction here: Treasury sanctions on BDA are a matter of U.S. law; the U.N. sanctions are a different matter under a different authority.

Christopher Hill promised to “make his best efforts” to resolve its financial disagreements with North Korea, but that he was “not confident of the outcome,” at least that’s what “a senior South Korean government official” told a journalist. Hill also told the North Koreans that yes, in fact, the United States would comply with and implement U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718. U.S. Ambassador Alexander Vershbow explained the American position at exactly the kind of place that few of his predecessors had the vision to visit — a college in Seoul:

“We are all encouraged that in Beijing on Tuesday North Korea agreed to return to the six-party talks without pre-conditions. This is a welcome step, but there’s a long way to go before the North Korean nuclear crisis is resolved.

“It remains a task of the international community to convince the DPRK (North Korea) that it must fulfill its commitment to the peaceful denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” he said. “Resolution 1718 was passed unanimously, and remains in force until North Korea complies with its terms, that is until North Korea is denuclearized.”

Yet the North Koreans still came back to the table. It was Kim Geun Tae who lost his cool, or more accurately, saw a chance to advance his presidential ambitions through dime-store demagoguery. Vershbow’s ambassadorial response was that he “‘respects’ Kim’s opinion,” and wisely left it at that.  He was more blunt when he defended the Proliferation Security Initiative against Uri’s distortions recently.

U.S. Ambassador Alexander Vershbow on Monday slammed senior Korean politicians for their “absurd” belief that joining the U.S.-led Proliferation Security Initiative aimed at intercepting North Korean ships would cause immediate military conflict.

….

The envoy said if more countries starting with South Korea took an active role in the PSI, it would send North Korea a clear and strong message and help resolve the nuclear crisis.

Asked about his feelings on the South Korean government’s decision to continue with joint projects like the Kaesong Industrial Complex and tours to Mt. Kumgang in the wake of the North’s nuclear test, Vershbow said he expects the government to give those ventures another long, hard look in light of UN Security Council Resolution 1718. The ambassador said the resolution aims to block the flow of money that directly or indirectly goes to the production of weapons of mass destruction. He added North Korea is an economy where it is hard to draw the line between government and civilian spheres.

Lest the next round of talks be all about North Korea’s demands, the United States announced some of its own.

The U.S. will ask North Korea for evidence that it is serious about dismantling its nuclear weapons program, including shutting down a reactor in Yongbyon and admitting IAEA inspectors, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Tuesday.
….

Rice emphasized Washington and other participants in the six-party talks will try to force the North to produce concrete evidence, including dismantling the 5 megawatt reactor in Yongybyon.

One U.S. official at the negotiations said, “The dismantling should begin with a facility like North Korea’s 5-megawatt reactor, which is continuing to produce nuclear fuel, or its plutonium reprocessing center, where spent reactor fuel can be turned into material for weapons.

By now, I suspect we know that the North Koreans will never go for that, but it has great cosmetic value that the North Koreans will certainly refuse. But if we ever expect real progress — by changing the regime’s behavior or its DNA — we will have to keep up the pressure in the meantime.