North Korea laid down rigid conditions yesterday for dialogue with Seoul or Washington, including the withdrawal of UN sanctions and a guaranteed end to South Korea-US joint military drills.
The list of demands from the North’s top military body was swiftly rejected as “incomprehensible” by South Korea, which, together with the US, has made any talks conditional on the North taking steps toward denuclearization.
Dialogue has become the new focus of a blistering rhetorical battle that has sent military tensions soaring on the Korean Peninsula ever since the North carried out its third nuclear test in February.
Photo: AFP
Some analysts see the North’s engagement in a debate over dialogue — no matter how unrealistic the conditions — as a welcome shift from the apocalyptic threats of nuclear war that have poured out of Pyongyang in recent weeks.
“I don’t think Pyongyang really expects these conditions to be met,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul. “It’s an initial show of strength in a game of tug-of-war that at least shows a desire to have a dialogue down the line.”
The first step demanded by the North’s National Military Commission was the withdrawal of “cooked up” UN sanctions that were imposed after the nuclear test in February.
North Korea has repeatedly cited the sanctions as a prime trigger for the current crisis.
The other main bone of contention has been ongoing joint South Korea-US military drills, which have involved the deployment of nuclear-capable B-52s and B-2 stealth aircraft.
Both countries must provide international guarantees that such “nuclear war drills” will never be repeated, the commission said.
“Dialogue and war games can never go together,” it added.
South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Cho Tai-young called the North’s pre-conditions “absurd” and said it was time for Pyongyang to choose engagement with the international community over provocation.
“We strongly urge the North to stop making such incomprehensible demands and to make the wise choice we have repeatedly urged,” Cho told a press briefing.
Daniel Pinkston, a North Korea expert with the International Crisis Group, ruled out any suggestion that the North was softening its position and said those hoping a dialogue might emerge were being willfully naive.
North Korea, Pinkston argued, had bound itself to a course that could only end with its recognition as a nuclear power — a status that is anathema to Washington and the US’ allies.
“So what is there to even talk about?” Pinkston asked.
“The North is committed. It’s burned its bridges. Any reversal could only be made at immense domestic cost to the regime, and there is simply no way any US administration is going to sit down and confirm a change in the status quo with the North as a nuclear state,” Pinkston said.
“We’re still firmly on a collision course and it’s not going to end well,” he said.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye has made tentative — and conditional — offers of talks, which received the backing of US Secretary of State John Kerry during his recent visit to northeast Asia.
Both Park and Kerry stressed that any talks would have to be substantive and predicated on signals from North Korea that it “change its ways” and respect its international obligations, especially with its nuclear program.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged Pyongyang on Wednesday to “seriously” consider Seoul’s offer.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not