North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has ordered his officials to arrange a meeting with a high-ranking US official, possibly with President George W. Bush, a news report said yesterday.
Kim told his Foreign Ministry to make arrangements for a visit to the North by a prominent US figure, personally mentioning Bush, former President George H.W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as possible visitors, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported, citing an anonymous source familiar with North Korean affairs.
Officials at South Korea's Unification Ministry and Foreign Ministry couldn't confirm the report.
The latest round of international talks on North Korea's nuclear program in Beijing produced a landmark accord Monday where Pyongyang agreed to abandon its nuclear program in exchange for economic aid, security assurances and improved ties with the US.
After the talks, chief US negotiator Christopher Hill said he was willing to visit North Korea to keep channels of communication open, but many factors would determine whether such a visit could be made.
North Korea has long tried to engage the US in bilateral talks, believing such meetings would boost its international status and help it win bigger concessions at the nuclear talks also involving China, Japan, Russia and South Korea.
In October 2000, then-US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visited Pyongyang and met the North Korean leader.
Pyongyang said that US envoy Christopher Hill was welcome to visit and that no conditions would be attached.
"If Christopher Hill is willing to visit my country with an intention of resolving the nuclear issue, then we would always welcome him," North Korea's Deputy Foreign Minister Choe Su-hon told a group of reporters, including China's Xinhua news agency.
"There will be no condition if he is willing to come to my country with a view to resolving the nuclear issue and other issues of his concern," he said at the North Korean mission to the UN in New York.
On Tuesday the Stalinist nation warned it would not dismantle its nuclear weapons until the US delivered light-water reactors to allow it to generate power, casting doubt on its commitments.
Washington says the reactors would be discussed only after North Korea abandons its nuclear weapons in a verifiable manner.
Despite the rhetoric, Choe said his government had noticed that the US attitude towards North Korea had changed recently, highlighted by the joint statement in which the US pledged to recognize North Korea's sovereignty.
"This is different from what the United States has been saying [in past years]," he said.
Pins hidden in her shoes, head forced down a toilet, kicked in the stomach: South Korean hairdresser Pyo Ye-rim suffered a litany of abuse from school bullies, but now she is speaking out. The 26-year-old is part of a phenomenon sweeping South Korea known as “Hakpok #MeToo,” where people who were bullied publicly name and shame the perpetrators of school violence — “hakpok” in Korean — decades after the alleged crimes. Made famous globally by Netflix’s gory revenge series The Glory, the movement has ensnared everyone from K-pop stars to baseball players and accusations — often anonymous — can be career-ending, with
One of Australia’s two active volcanoes on an island near Antarctica — known as Big Ben — has been spotted by satellite spewing lava. The lava flow on the uninhabited Heard Island, about 4,100km southwest of Perth and 1,500km north of Antarctica, is part of an ongoing eruption that was first noted more than a decade ago. The image was caught by the European Space Agency’s Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite on Thursday, and is a composite of an optical picture and an infrared image. The lava is seen flowing down the side of Big Ben from near the summit, known as Mawson Peak.
SYMBOLIC: The bill sponsored by a cross-party group of lawmakers was hailed as a ‘historic moment’ in the fight for marriage equality, but is unlikely to pass Lawmakers in South Korea have proposed the country’s first same-sex marriage bill, in a move hailed by civic groups as a defining moment in the fight for equality. The marriage equality bill, proposed by South Korean lawmaker Jang Hye-yeong of the minor opposition Justice Party and co-sponsored by 12 lawmakers across all the main parties, seeks to amend the country’s civil code to allow same-sex marriage. The bill is unlikely to pass, but forms part of a trio of bills expected to increase pressure on the government to expand the idea of family beyond traditional criteria. The two other bills relate to
TIME TO TALK: Among China’s grievances were economic and trade issues related to Taiwan, but both countries emphasized the need to maintain communication US Trade Representative Katherine Tai (戴琪) on Friday raised complaints about China’s state-led economic policies during a meeting with Chinese Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao (王文濤), who objected to US tariffs and trade policies, as well as issues related to Taiwan, their offices said. However, statements from the US Trade Representative’s (USTR) office and the Chinese Ministry of Commerce emphasized the need for Washington and Beijing to maintain communication on trade. “Ambassador Tai highlighted the need to address the critical imbalances caused by China’s state-led, non-market approach to the economy and trade policy,” the USTR said in a statement released after the
RSS