China agrees with the US that denuclearization talks can only resume if Pyongyang shows its seriousness about past agreements, a senior US official said yesterday.
China has called for the resumption of talks on ending North Korea’s nuclear program and faced strong criticism from some US lawmakers, who believe Beijing has not done enough to prod its neighbor.
However, US Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg, who recently met with China’s chief nuclear negotiator, said Washington and Beijing agreed that North Korea needed to adhere to a 2005 denuclearization agreement before new talks.
“I think that there is a recognition that there is simply little value in moving forward without some very concrete indication that the North Koreans are interested in implementing the 2005 statement,” Steinberg said.
“And the Chinese were very clear on that. There was no disagreement at all,” Steinberg told a forum at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
“They realize that given what’s happened on a number of fronts — both with the actions of the North Koreans last year and then following the Cheonan — that we are not simply going to go back to talking,” he said.
North Korea tested a long-range missile and a nuclear bomb last year and stormed out of six-nation denuclearization talks. In March, South Korea’s Cheonan sank, killing 46 sailors. The US and Seoul say that North Korea torpedoed the vessel.
China has not endorsed the findings of the Cheonan probe and its state media has urged the US, South Korea and Japan not to “bully” the North.
Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu (姜瑜) said last Thursday that Beijing and Washington both wanted dialogue to “create conditions for the early resumption of the six-party talks.”
In the 2005 agreement and a related statement in 2007, North Korea agreed to give up its nuclear weapons in return for security guarantees and badly needed aid.
In related news, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sought ideas on Monday in New York from Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi (楊潔篪) about how to engage diplomatically with both the North and Iran in a bid to curb their nuclear ambitions, her spokesman Philip Crowley said, adding that Clinton also discussed the need to fully implement existing UN Security Council sanctions against both countries.
Clinton sought “Chinese ideas on how to successfully engage both countries, at the same time reaffirming that we will continue to fully implement both [sanctions] resolutions,” Crowley said.
As the sun sets on another scorching Yangon day, the hot and bothered descend on the Myanmar city’s parks, the coolest place to spend an evening during yet another power blackout. A wave of exceptionally hot weather has blasted Southeast Asia this week, sending the mercury to 45°C and prompting thousands of schools to suspend in-person classes. Even before the chaos and conflict unleashed by the military’s 2021 coup, Myanmar’s creaky and outdated electricity grid struggled to keep fans whirling and air conditioners humming during the hot season. Now, infrastructure attacks and dwindling offshore gas reserves mean those who cannot afford expensive diesel
Does Argentine President Javier Milei communicate with a ghost dog whose death he refuses to accept? Forced to respond to questions about his mental health, the president’s office has lashed out at “disrespectful” speculation. Twice this week, presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni was asked about Milei’s English Mastiff, Conan, said to have died seven years ago. Milei, 53, had Conan cloned, and today is believed to own four copies he refers to as “four-legged children.” Or is it five? In an interview with CNN this month, Milei referred to his five dogs, whose faces and names he had engraved on the presidential baton. Conan,
French singer Kendji Girac, who was seriously injured by a gunshot this week, wanted to “fake” his suicide to scare his partner who was threatening to leave him, prosecutors said on Thursday. The 27-year-old former winner of France’s version of The Voice was found wounded after police were called to a traveler camp in Biscarrosse on France’s southwestern coast. Girac told first responders he had accidentally shot himself while tinkering with a Colt .45 automatic pistol he had bought at a junk shop, a source said. On Thursday, regional prosecutor Olivier Janson said, citing the singer, that he wanted to “fake” his suicide
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi reaffirmed his pledge to replace India’s religion-based marriage and inheritance laws with a uniform civil code if he returns to office for a third term, a move that some minority groups have opposed. In an interview with the Times of India listing his agenda, Modi said his government would push for making the code a reality. “It is clear that separate laws for communities are detrimental to the health of society,” he said in the interview published yesterday. “We cannot be a nation where one community is progressing with the support of the Constitution while the other