|
Washington and Pyongyang appear to be surmounting a critical hurdle in the North Korean nuclear crisis. The chief U.S. and North Korean nuclear negotiators met in Singapore on April 8 and reached an agreement requiring Pyongyang to declare its stockpile of extracted plutonium in the near future, while Washington begins the process of taking the country off its list of terror sponsors. Suspicions that North Korea enriched uranium and offered nuclear assistance to Syria are expected to be handled with the U.S. making a report on these two issues ¡°on North Korea's behalf¡± and North Korea ¡°acknowledging U.S. concerns¡± about those issues. The White House said President George W. Bush would accept this agreement.
The U.S. is probably dissatisfied with the way the issue is being handled, four months past the deadline for North Korea to declare its nuclear inventory. The key areas of U.S. interest -- whether or not North Korea enriched uranium and suspicions over its nuclear assistance to Syria -- have not been clearly answered. But a far more urgent concern is whether North Korea will honestly declare the accurate amount of plutonium it has extracted. This is of particular concern for South Korea.
If the U.S. Congress gives the green light to the Singapore agreement, efforts to dismantle North Korea¡¯s nuclear program move on to the phase of verifying the volume and usage of the extracted plutonium the communist country declares. The North Korean nuclear problem is getting closer to its essence.
There are rumors that North Korea will declare it has extracted 30 kg of plutonium. That is the minimum quantity U.S. intelligence officials estimate. The maximum estimate is around 50 kg. North Korea may try to deceive the international community by saying it had extracted only 30 kg, while it actually has 50 kg -- it is more than capable of doing that.
In that case, the key to the next phase is whether it is possible to precisely verify North Korea¡¯s declared stockpile. There could be drawn-out wrangling over who will oversee the verification process, how it will be conducted, the subject of verification and the time that will be given. But the overriding principle of thoroughly investigating North Korea¡¯s past nuclear activities must not be shaken. If North Korea has made a firm decision to find a new path by being compensated for genuinely abandoning its nuclear program, then there is no reason why it should delay verification and take such a passive attitude. It will be possible to measure North Korea¡¯s true intentions by the way it deals with the verification process.
During their summit on April 18, presidents Lee Myung-bak and Bush must arrive at a water-tight agreement in this area.
|
