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Diplomacy or saber-rattling? US, North Korea at crossroads

3 May, 2017 | Filed under: All News,more news,Opinion,RECENT POSTS,Somali news | Posted by:

Diplomacy or saber-rattling? US, North Korea at crossroads

Trump opens door to meeting Kim ‘under the right circumstances’

HIROSHI MINEGISHI and TSUYOSHI NAGASAWA, Nikkei staff writers

SEOUL/WASHINGTON — The U.S. and North Korea have reached a key turning point in their standoff over Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile development, with the American president making unusual overtures amid heightened military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

“If it would be appropriate for me to meet with [North Korean leader Kim Jong Un], I would absolutely, I would be honored to do it,” U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday in an interview with Bloomberg News. This is the first time he expressed an openness to meeting Kim since taking office in January.


U.S. President Donald Trump, left, and North Korea leader Kim Jong Un © AP

Tensions between Pyongyang and Washington have passed their peak thanks to Pyongyang’s strong deterrence, North Korea’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement Monday. Trump’s remark may have been in response to this.

North Korea celebrated a number of key holidays in April, including the 105th anniversary of the birth of the country founder, Kim Il Sung, and the 85th anniversary of the creation of its military. No major celebration is scheduled in the immediate future. Many experts think Pyongyang, secure with Kim Jong Un’s standing after recent festivities, could now turn its focus to diplomacy.

Two-sided message

The North issued a military threat to the U.S. while also expressing the need it feels for conversation, said Kyungnam University professor Yang Moo-jin of Monday’s statement.

At a Workers’ Party congress last May, Kim announced his plans to focus on foreign policy and to forge relationships appropriate for a nuclear-armed state. He also revived a diplomatic committee for the first time in two decades at a parliamentary assembly last month, and assigned experienced diplomats to key posts. Trump’s recent comment is a boon for North Korea, which wants to negotiate a peace treaty to replace the current armistice in the Korean Peninsula.

North Korea’s annual rice-planting season will also start in mid-May. Students will halt their studies for a month to plant crops in agricultural villages. Soldiers, of course, are another key source of labor. If continued tensions keep them away from the fields, the country could face a significant food shortage come fall. Pyongyang wants to avoid drawing out any conflicts.

The question is whether the U.S. will agree to direct discussions with the North. The Trump administration has signaled a clear break from former President Barack Obama’s approach of “strategic patience,” and refuses to talk for the sake of talking. The administration will likely demand that North Korea abandon its nuclear arms and stop developing intercontinental ballistic missiles before any dialogue can take place.

Trump stressed Monday that he would only meet Kim “under the right circumstances,” and not “under any circumstances where he can launch missiles into the United States.”

Source:asia.nikkei.com