US ready to help a non-nuclear N.Korea
- Source: Global Times
- [01:40 November 20 2009]
- Comments
US President Barack Obama said yesterday he is willing to help North Korea repair its economy and end decades of international isolation if Pyongyang stops a cycle of threats and finally moves toward nuclear disarmament.
"Our message is clear. If North Korea is prepared to take concrete and irrevers-ible steps to fulfill its obligations and eliminate its nuclear weapons program, the United States will support economic assistance and help promote its full inte-gration into the community of nations," Obama told reporters at the end of his week-long tour of Asia.
He said he would send his first envoy to North Korea on December 8 to press Pyongyang to return to talks with regional powers and pleadge to give up building a nuclear arsenal.
Analysts said he would not have agreed to such a meeting if he was not sure Pyongyang would reciprocate by returning to talks.
"I hope that by accepting our proposal, the North will secure safety for itself, improve the quality of life for its people, and open the path to a new future," South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak said.
Obama spoke to some of the 28,000 US soldiers stationed at Osan in the South before flying home.
North Korea has argued that it is those troops that forced it to develop nuclear weapons as a protection from attack.
"The US imperialist aggressor forces' presence in South Korea and their daily intensifying moves for a war of aggression against the DPRK (North Korea) are the main factor of disturbing peace and security on the Korean peninsula," the North's official Rodong Sinmun daily said in a commentary Thursday.
On the same day, upon the announcement of US envoy Bosworth's visit to North Korea, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said China "supports and welcomes the bilateral dialogue between the US and the DPRK."
"We hope the moves by the relevant parties will be conducive to the resumption of the Six-Party Talks and the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula," Qin said.
In a related development Wednesday, a new report written by an expert panel from the UN Security Council indicated that North Korea had taken elaborate measures to evade UN sanctions aimed at its nuclear and missile activities, arms trading and import of luxuries.
These measures include "falsification of manifests, fallacious labeling and description of cargo, the use of multiple layers of intermediaries, 'shell' companies and financial institutions to hide the true originators and recipients."
"In many cases, overseas accounts maintained for, or on behalf of, the DPRK are likely being used for this purpose, making it difficult to trace such transactions or to relate them to the precise cargo they are intended to cover," the report said.
Agencies
