|
SLUG: 3-522 Dae-Sook-Korea
DATE: NOTE NUMBER: |
||
DATE=2/6/03 TYPE=INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT TITLE=DAE-SOOK / KOREA NUMBER=3-522 BYLINE=VICTOR BEATTIE DATELINE=WASHINGTON INTERNET= ///// AVAILABLE IN DALET UNDER SOD/ENGLISH NEWS NOW INTERVIEWS IN THE FOLDER FOR TODAY OR YESTERDAY ///// HOST: Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armistage told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this week he has no doubt the United States and North Korea will have a dialogue on Pyongyang's nuclear development program. Mr. Armitage was responding to a statement by the committee's chairman, Republican Senator Richard Lugar, who said direct talks might lead to a non-aggression guarantee, potential commercial relations and urgent humanitarian food and fuel contributions to assist the North Korean people. V-O-A's Victor Beattie spoke with Dae-sook Suh (DEH-SUK-SAH), a professor of political science at the University of Hawaii who agrees that talks with Pyongyang are the best way to defuse the current impasse over its nuclear program:
PROF. SUH: I think it is the best policy. Instead of threatening, as they have been doing, I think it is a good idea to talk, hold a talk with the North Koreans about nuclear issues. MR. BEATTIE: What does North Korea want through its resumption of its nuclear program and breaking these past agreements? PROF. SUH: I think, basically, North Korea wants to be a member of the world community. After the end of the Cold War, we were talking all about the soft landing of North Korea into the new world order, so to speak, with the absence of the Soviet Union, which was the greatest backer of North Korea. The Soviet Union established North Korea and maintained it in the past century, but the Soviet Union itself collapsed. So, North Korea's existence, in their mind, has been threatened. Therefore, they want to survive in this new world order. And for their survival, what they have chosen is what they call military-first politics in North Korea, where the manufacturing of nuclear weapons and the shooting of missiles are essential for their policy. MR. BEATTIE: If direct talks resume between the U.S. and North Korea, what will they talk about? PROF. SUH: I think they will talk about the cessation of production of weapons of mass destruction in North Korea and the cessation of testing of missiles or, for that matter, I think for the selling of weapons of mass destruction or some sort of -- like plutonium, the selling of plutonium or the selling of missiles to other countries. I think this should be stopped. And the North Koreans will definitely seek the price for their cessation of the manufacturing of these weapons. MR. BEATTIE: Now, talks before have led to broken agreements. What do you think will occur now that will lead to a different conclusion? PROF. SUH: I think there is a great deal of misunderstanding. I am not trying to speak on behalf of North Korea or anything of that nature. I think the United States' allegation of the North Korean breach of the Agreed Framework of October 1994 is overstating the case. That is, North Korea is not cheating the United States for this breach of this 1994 agreement, but the United States promised in the 1994 Agreed Framework that they will build two lightwater reactors to generate electricity in North Korea within 10 years from 1994. That 10-years is up this year, in 2003, and the lightwater reactor is nowhere near completion. And when James Kelly went to North Korea, he talked to the North Korean diplomat and James Kelly came back and reported that the North Koreans admitted that they were restarting this nuclear facility in North Korea and came back and reported that, saying that North Korea breached the 1994 Agreed Framework. But the North Korean side, if you read the North Korean newspaper all the way through before and after James Kelly's visit to North Korea, North Korea never said what James Kelly had reported in the United States. And subsequently, things went bad for the relationship between North Korea and the United States. It went sour. Therefore, the United States stopped giving oil for this past winter, this winter. Therefore, North Korea has no choice but to start this thing. I A not trying to justify the North Korean position, but I think the facts should be clearly laid out. It's not all the United States is good and North Korea is evil. HOST: Dae-sook Suh is a political science professor at the University of Hawaii. NEB/VB/RAE |
||
