North Korea's nuclear envoy said yesterday that his country won't unilaterally abandon its atomic weapons program after two days of meetings with his US counterpart failed to produce a date on restarting six-nation disarmament talks.
There had been hopes that the discussions between North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan and US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill in Beijing would result in an agreement on when to resume the multi-nation negotiations that have been stalled for over a year.
But Kim, after meeting South Korea's main negotiator Chun Yung-woo yesterday in Beijing, said Pyongyang still remains committed to an agreement made last year on denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
PHOTO: AP
"Our denuclearization is the great leader's [Kim Il-sung's] `dying instruction' and we are ready to implement our commitment in the Sept. 19 joint statement," he said, referring to the leader of North Korea from its founding in 1948 until his death in 1994.
Kim added that his country "cannot unilaterally abandon" its atomic weapons program at this point.
Hill said he presented ideas to Kim on how the North Korean regime -- which conducted its first nuclear test last month -- could disarm.
"These are ideas designed to make rapid progress," Hill told reporters before flying to Washington, with a brief stop in Tokyo. "We discussed them and they're taking them back to Pyongyang and we hope to hear from them soon."
He said dates for the next round of six-nation discussions were raised but gave no details. The China-hosted talks involve the US, North Korea, Japan, South Korea and Russia, which has not sent an envoy to Beijing for the informal talks.
"The purpose is that when we start the talks, that we really do make progress," Hill said. "The purpose of the six-party talks is not to talk, it's to achieve the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula."
Pressure to get Pyongyang back to the negotiating table has increased since North Korea conducted its first nuclear test on Oct. 9, which raised severe security concerns in Japan, and broader fears it could trigger a regional arms race.
Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso said his country has the technological know-how to produce a nuclear weapon, but no immediate plans to do so.
"Japan is capable of producing nuclear weapons," Aso told a parliamentary committee on security issues yesterday. "But we are not saying we have plans to possess nuclear weapons."
Aso, who has called for discussion of Japan's non-nuclear policy, also said Japan's pacifist constitution does not forbid possession of an atomic bomb for defense.
The Kyodo News agency cited unidentified people at the Beijing talks as saying that Kim demanded that the US lift financial sanctions and freeze UN sanctions that were imposed after the North's Oct. 9 nuclear test.
Hill said the issue of Washington-imposed sanctions was discussed but he made it clear that denuclearization had to be addressed first.
"The best way for them to get out of sanctions is to get out of nuclear programs," he said. "Unless they denuclearize, nothing is going to be possible."
‘ABSURD MISTAKE’: The election commission said that there had been a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations ran short of ballot papers South Korean riot police yesterday cleared protesters from a Seoul polling station after a 35-hour blockade sparked by a shortage of ballot papers during local elections earlier this week. Wednesday’s election was the first nationwide vote since South Korean President Lee Jae-myung took office following the ouster of Yoon Suk-yeol over his short-lived martial law declaration. Lee’s ruling Democratic Party swept most races, but failed to flip the crucial Seoul mayoral seat. The South Korean National Election Commission apologized, blaming a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations in Seoul ran short of ballot papers. Some polling stations stayed open until 10pm to
France experienced its hottest spring on record, the French weather service said on Tuesday, after an exceptional early heat wave that also broke highs for the season in England and Wales. Meteo-France said the average nationwide temperature over March to May was 13.8°C — about 1.7°C above the norm, and surpassing records set in 2011 and 2020. “The warmest spring since records began in 1900,” it said in a bulletin. All three months were warmer than average, but the onset of an “unprecedented heatwave” late last month pushed the mercury to highs typically seen at the height of the summer. “Our country had never
A Sherpa guide was found crawling to base camp on Mount Everest a week after he went missing and was reunited with his family, who had given up hope he would return. Dawa Sherpa was last seen on Friday last week descending the mountain, but he did not reach base camp even though his client did. The pair were among the last climbers on the mountain as the climbing season came to an end and the route was dismantled. Dawa was located by a cleaning crew on Thursday morning as he was crawling down the snowy slopes around the Khumbu Icefall, just above
Chinese authorities are snuffing out any remembrance of the deadly 1989 military crackdown on student-led pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square, which happened 37 years ago yesterday, in a further tightening of a years-long campaign to erase what happened from public memory. Police told relatives of the victims they would not be allowed to visit a cemetery in Beijing on the anniversary of the crackdown, a person with knowledge of the matter said. Relatives of the victims visited the cemetery on the anniversary for more than 30 years to read memorial statements with police keeping watch, Amnesty International said. Hundreds of people,
RSS