Wednesday, February 14, 2007

North Korea Makes Nice

So a wrap of the North Korea news is in order. We won, might makes right! I am just kidding. It seems that the multilateral approach with the heavy support of South Korea and China was the tipping factor.

What caused the deal?
"For Mr. Bush, bogged down in Iraq, his authority undercut by the November elections, any chance to show progress in peacefully disarming a country that detonated a nuclear test just four months ago could no longer be passed up. As one senior administration official said over the weekend, the prospect that Mr. Bush might leave Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea more dangerous places than he found them “can’t be very appealing.”
"For Mr. Kim, the nuclear explosion — more of a fizzle — that he set off in the mountains not far from the Chinese border in October turned out to be a strategic mistake. The Chinese, who spent six decades protecting the Kim family dynasty, responded by cutting off his military aid, and helping Washington crack down on the banks that financed the Cognac-and-Mercedes lifestyle of the North Korean leadership."

Who hates the deal? John Bolton does "From the other end of the spectrum, John R. Bolton, who until December served under Ms. Rice as the United States ambassador to the United Nations, criticized the pact as too weak, telling CNN that it “contradicts fundamental premises” of the administration’s approach to North Korea during the past six years."


the Germans
Published: February 14, 2007
A meeting between American and North Korean envoys in late December would be critical in shaping the agreement reached Tuesday in Beijing.

Japan is still a little upset about the abductions
"Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was criticized over his government’s refusal to join in providing aid to North Korea under the new nuclear agreement."
“Japanese diplomacy has, so to speak, been abducted by the abduction issue,” Mr. Taniguchi said.
The Japanese government said it hoped to address the abduction issue in a working group to be established under the accord, aimed at normalizing relations between Japan and North Korea. Tokyo has said in the past that it could not establish normal relations or pay reparations for its colonial rule of Korea before World War II unless the abducted Japanese citizens were accounted for. But Japan’s emphasis on the abductions in the working group is likelyto bring forth a long list of historical grievances from North Korea."

Update:
Is the NK agreement Bush's defining legacy?

For Bush, a `Nixon to China' moment

"But the agreement American negotiators have forged with North Korea brings to mind a happier precedent: Richard Nixon's opening to China, a surprising breakthrough that belied his hard-line record and shrewdly advanced American interests in a vital part of the world."



2 comments:

Robert L [Rivalries] said...

This is the type of problematic thinking that rules this world. Nothing has really changed other than the fact that he's not threatning us. The people that live in North Korea are still screwed with this jackass in power. They will continue to live in thrid world conditions and will continue to starve. But I guess since that doesn't directly affect us or the Europeans it does not matter and the problem is solved.

Anonymous said...

North Korea making nice is far from over. Give it a few months or maybe even years, and they'll be right back to detonating what they claim to be nuclear bombs. As long as Kim is still in charge, he will continue to starve his people and have ambitions of becoming a power country. It doesn't help that part of the "agreement" included the promise that the US would not attack NK.