A US envoy vowed to muster "maximum international pressure" on North Korea yesterday, as a South Korean negotiator was visiting the communist state to urge it to abandon its nuclear weapons program or risk a confrontation with Washington.
US Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly, speaking after meetings with Chinese and South Korean officials, said no deadline had been set in the campaign to pressure the North to abandon its covert nuclear program.
Kelly, however, stressed that the isolated, impoverished North's best way to resume dialogue with Washington to improve ties and win badly needed aid was to give up its newly revealed nuclear program that violated a 1994 agreement with Washington.
"The United States is focused now on consultations with friends and allies and we hope to bring maximum international pressure on North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions," Kelly said at a news conference after meeting South Korean Foreign Minister Choi Sung-hong.
Kelly flew to Seoul early yesterday from Beijing, where he and US Undersecretary of State John Bolton held two lengthy meetings with Chinese officials on the North's nuclear program.
Kelly planned to travel to Japan today to continue consultations with regional powers.
"The Chinese made it very clear that they strongly oppose any nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula," Kelly said.
The US envoy traveled to North Korea on Oct. 3 to Oct. 5, when communist negotiators admitted to a secret nuclear program after Kelly confronted them with evidence of a program to enrich uranium for atomic bombs.
"I will have straight talk about the nuclear issue," South Korean Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun said earlier yesterday before heading with a 48-member delegation to Pyongyang for talks.
The two Koreas had agreed earlier to use the latest round of Cabinet-level talks to promote reconciliation. Now Jeong says his most urgent task will be to gauge whether it wants dialogue or confrontation.
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