By Ryu Jin, Park Song-wu
Staff Reporter


Unification Minister Chung Dong-young urged North Korea on Monday to make a ``strategic decision’’ to reopen dialogue channels, saying the environment for the inter-Korean talks has ripened with the successful summit between President Roh Moo-hyun and his U.S. counterpart George W. Bush.

``We will do our best to resume government-level talks with the North regardless of their format,’’ Chung told editorial writers of domestic news media in Seoul. ``I hope the North will not be too late in making a strategic decision.’’

Arguing that the current stalemate in the six-party talks was partly due to a ``deep’’ distrust between Washington and Pyongyang, Chung said Seoul successfully talked Washington into seeing the Stalinist state as a ``partner’’ for negotiation during the summit, which was held on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Santiago, Chile.

``Now we will work closely with Japan, China and Russia for an early resumption of the six-nation talks,’’ Chung said.

Foreign Affairs-Trade Minister Ban Ki-moon also said in Chile on Sunday that North Korea ``must not squander momentum’’ created by top-level discussions about its nuclear programs at the APEC forum.

``President George W. Bush’s meetings with counterparts from South Korea, China, Japan and Russia provided a chance to jump-start the stalled talks,’’ Ban told Reuters, adding that these diplomatic efforts will help to create a ``very favorable atmosphere.’’

With major parties in the six-way talks speeding up their efforts to resume dialogue over North Korea’s nuclear programs after a series of summits last week, Seoul’s role and proposals are likely to gain more support in the coming negotiations.

South Korea has been working for a ``more creative’’ set of proposals, which some diplomatic sources in Seoul say will include asking the U.S. to participate in the energy aid to the North in order to bring the communist regime back to the negotiation table.

``We have our own proposals that have been further developed since the last round of talks,’’ a Seoul official told The Korea Times on condition of anonymity. ``We’ll actively sell other parties on our proposals if a working-group meeting is held soon.’’

But some experts raised concerns that South Korea’s drive could fail to bear fruit despite its strong enthusiasm unless the main antagonists _ the U.S. and North Korea _ meet halfway.

Calling for a more flexible attitude from Washington on one hand, experts said, Seoul is also trying to persuade Pyongyang not to drag out the current stalemate.

Restating offers of security guarantees and economic and energy assistance once North Korea commits to a process of dismantling its nuclear weapons programs, Ban said: ``A much better future will lie ahead when they make a strategic decision.’’

North Korea and the U.S., along with South Korea, China, Japan and Russia, have met three times in the multilateral talks, in which Seoul, Washington and Pyongyang have each presented their own proposals.

But the fourth round, originally set for September, has yet to be held as Pyongyang is believed to have stalled the talks until after the U.S. presidential race.

The Seoul and Washington governments’ proposals toward Pyongyang, though separate, were regarded to be similar and based on close coordination between the allies. But Ban stressed Seoul’s ``coordinated steps’’ approach was ``more flexible’’ on the sequence of assistance to match North Korean disarmament pledges and actions.

``Coordinated steps means that when North Korea commits themselves to give up their nuclear development program, then our side will be prepared to provide some provisional security assurances together with energy assistance,’’ he said.

``The essence of negotiation is always to try to agree on mutually acceptable elements, so we need to be realistic, pragmatic and flexible _ and sometimes we need to have some creativity,’’ he said.

Meanwhile, Choson Sinbo, a pro-Pyongyang newspaper in Japan, praised Roh’s remarks in Los Angeles on Nov. 13 that the North is trying to arm itself with the nuclear weapons in self defense.

``Roh’s clear intention to check the elated Washington government, which is losing its rationality and only pushing through with its hawkish policies toward Pyongyang, was clearly seen in his message directed at the second Bush administration,’’ the daily reported in its Nov. 17 edition.

jinryu@koreatimes.co.kr
im@koreatimes.co.kr