US official handling N.Korea sanctions visits S.Korea

N.Korea on agenda for S.Korea FM visit to China
Beijing (AFP) March 11, 2010 - China said Thursday that South Korea's foreign minister would visit Beijing next week for the latest round of talks on how to get North Korea back to stalled nuclear disarmament negotiations. Yu Myung-Hwan would meet his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi during the mid-week visit, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters. "I think the six-party talks, the denuclearisation process of the Korean peninsula and resumption of six-party talks will be put on the table," Qin said. "We would like to make joint efforts with South Korea on this issue, especially now that we have a good opportunity to promote the early resumption of the six-party talks."

China is the host of the on-off negotiations, which also include the two Koreas, Japan, Russia and the United States, and which have been on ice since Pyongyang stormed out in April last year. Beijing is also North Korea's sole major ally. The North has set two conditions for returning to dialogue: the lifting of UN sanctions and a US commitment to discuss a formal peace treaty to replace the armistice which ended the 1950-1953 Korean War. Washington, Seoul and Tokyo say the North must first return to the negotiating table and show it is serious about giving up its nuclear drive. Yu's visit is the latest in a flurry of meetings on the North Korean nuclear issue, with negotiators and diplomats from the countries involved criss-crossing Northeast Asia in recent weeks for consultations. The South Korean minister also visited Washington late last month for talks with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

by Staff Writers
Seoul (AFP) March 12, 2010
A senior US official in charge of financial sanctions on North Korea visited South Korea this week for talks, a foreign ministry official said Friday.

The official said Daniel Glaser, deputy assistant secretary of the treasury for terrorist financing and financial crimes, arrived Wednesday for a visit ending Friday along with Steven Mull, a senior US Foreign Service officer.

"They met foreign ministry officials and other authorities concerned to discuss the issue of non-proliferation," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Yonhap news agency quoted a diplomatic source as saying the talks concerned financial sanctions against North Korea.

The North demands the removal of United Nations sanctions before it returns to six-party nuclear disarmament talks. It also wants the United States to agree to start discussions about a permanent peace treaty before the nuclear forum resumes.

The United States, South Korea and Japan say it must come back to the nuclear talks and reaffirm commitment to disarmament agreements before other matters are discussed.

Japan's chief nuclear negotiator Akitaka Saiki and his South Korean counterpart Wi Sung-Lac reaffirmed that stance when they held talks Friday in Seoul, a foreign ministry official told reporters.

They agreed the North must return to the talks without preconditions, and removal of sanctions could only be considered when there was significant progress in denuclearisation, Yonhap news agency quoted the official as saying.

The ministry official said the sanctions issue, rather than the peace treaty, appeared to be blocking resumption of the talks which the North quit last April, a month before it staged its second atomic weapons test.

The United States has led a drive to enforce tougher UN sanctions imposed on the North last June following its nuclear and missile tests.

These include closer inspections of cargo suspected of containing banned missile and nuclear-related items, a tighter arms embargo and targeted financial curbs to choke off revenue for nuclear and missile development.

Several banned shipments of weaponry from the North have been seized since then.

In the latest reported case South Africa last month told the UN Security Council that it seized a shipment of North Korean spare parts for tanks bound for Congo.

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Experts on WMD taking part in US-S.Korea war games
Seoul (AFP) March 11, 2010
US experts in weapons of mass destruction are taking part in a military exercise simulating an attack by North Korea on South Korea, the US commander in the South said Thursday. The communist North has bitterly denounced the US-South Korean exercise as a preparation for a nuclear attack, and vowed to respond to any aggression with its atomic weapons. The visiting experts are from a team ... read more

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