The resumed six-party talks "had a good start" on the first day
despite serious disagreements over how to make the Korean Peninsula
nuclear-free, Jiang Yu, spokeswoman for the Chinese delegation,
said yesterday.
Though expressing optimism, she told a news briefing that "the
parties concerned remain divided by disagreements, some of them
very serious."
Delegates from China, the US, Russia, Japan, North and South
Korea met for the first time in Beijing yesterday after a 13-month
hiatus.
Wu Dawei, Chinese chief negotiator and vice foreign minister,
said after the opening ceremony that the talks should focus on how
to concretely implement the joint statement signed on September 19
last year in line with the "action-for-action" principle.
Under the 2005 deal, North Korea agreed to abandon its nuclear
program in return for aid and security guarantees. However, it
boycotted the talks two months later in protest against US
financial sanctions.
Wu urged all parties to "exert political wisdom, come up with
political determination and courage to make the Korean Peninsula
nuclear-free."
"We have finished the stage of commitment and now should follow
the principle of action-for-action," Wu said.
In opening comments, North Korean chief delegate Kim Kye-gwan
said that as his country is a nuclear power, the negotiations
should focus on arms reduction.
He demanded that all UN sanctions and US financial restrictions
be lifted before it disarms, and the country be provided with a
nuclear reactor for power generation and energy aid.
The US offered in its opening comments to normalize relations
with North Korea, but only after it halted its nuclear program.
US chief negotiator Christopher Hill said sanctions would remain
until North Korea stops its nuclear program. Hill said he hoped for
initial steps this week on implementing the September joint
statement "to demonstrate that the process indeed has legs and is
moving forward."
"The supply of our patience may have exceeded the international
demand for that patience, and we should be a little less patient
and pick up the pace and work faster," Hill told reporters.
According to Jiang, the US and North Korea will hold separate
consultations on the financial sanctions.
The talks, the first since November 2005, will be open-ended but
delegates said they expect a break for Christmas.
The dialogue comes amid a new political environment being shaped
by North Korea's October 9 nuclear test and US President George W.
Bush's loss of control over Congress to the Democrats in mid-term
elections. Bush is under increasing domestic pressure to resolve
the nuclear standoff through direct negotiations with
Pyongyang.
South Korean nuclear negotiator Chun Yung-woo urged the North to
"take bold and substantial initial steps" to dismantle its nuclear
program and stressed that the other five countries' corresponding
measures should also be bold and substantial.
(China Daily December 19, 2006)