April 25, 2005
White House May Go to U.N. Over North Korean Shipments
By DAVID E. SANGER
NYT's
ASHINGTON, April 24 - The Bush administration, facing a series of
recent provocations from North Korea, is debating a plan to seek a
United Nations resolution empowering all nations to intercept
shipments in or out of the country that may contain nuclear materials
or components, say senior administration officials and diplomats who
have been briefed on the proposal.
The resolution envisioned by a growing number of senior administration
officials would amount to a quarantine of North Korea, though, so far
at least, President Bush's aides are not using that word. It would
enable the United States and other nations to intercept shipments in
international waters off the Korean Peninsula and to force down
aircraft for inspection.
But, said several American and Asian officials, the main purpose would
be to give China political cover to police its border with North
Korea, the country's lifeline for food and oil. That border is now
largely open for shipments of arms, drugs and counterfeit currencies,
North Korea's main source of hard currency.
Two years of six-nation negotiations with North Korea have proved
fruitless so far. It is uncertain, however, that China and South Korea
would go along with any plan to step up pressure. To ward off a
confrontation with the North, the two nations have opposed taking the
issue to the United Nations Security Council.
Until last week, the administration insisted it was committed to
solving the North Korean crisis through six-nation negotiations. But
the discovery this month that North Korea has shut down its main
nuclear reactor - perhaps to harvest plutonium for more weapons -
prompted Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to raise publicly the
possibility of seeking United Nations action, a route the Clinton
administration took in 1994.
"We are willing - when the time is right, when we believe that we have
exhausted the possibilities of the framework we are in - to go to the
Security Council," Ms. Rice said on Thursday on Fox News.
But the administration has never said publicly what it would seek from
the United Nations. Though Ms. Rice made no mention of it, American
intelligence agencies were also trying to decipher the meaning of
renewed activity at a suspected North Korean nuclear test site.
Activity at the site in October and again in January led to concerns
that North Korea may be preparing for the first underground weapons
test - which would end any ambiguity about whether it has the
technology to build a warhead.
[In Seoul on Monday, South Korea's foreign minister, Ban Ki Moon,
warned North Korea against conducting any nuclear tests, saying they
would further isolate it, The Associated Press reported.]
"They are either heading toward a full nuclear breakout, so that we
are forced to deal with them as an established nuclear power, or they
are putting on quite a show for our satellites," said one senior
administration official, who added that the quarantine option had not
yet been formally presented to President Bush.
The White House has said little so far about North Korea's actions,
following a strategy very different from the one it pursued two years
ago with Iraq. Ms. Rice has repeatedly said that North Korea's pattern
is to seek a public reaction from Washington, and she has made clear
she does not intend to oblige.
But some experts say the statements and actions North Korea have taken
recently could mark a significant shift in strategy: It may now see a
chance to build a modest nuclear arsenal while the United States and
Asian nations debate how to react. The C.I.A. estimates that North
Korea already has enough plutonium for six or eight nuclear weapons.
"I'm afraid they are now more interested in getting away with it than
getting a reaction out of the United States," South Korea's former
foreign minister, Han Sung Joo, said in an interview last week.
Since February, when it declared itself a nuclear power, North Korea's
public statements have changed. It appears to be attempting to
establish itself as a nuclear power that, like Pakistan, is now
considered a permanent member of the nuclear club.
North Korea's No. 2 official, Kim Yong Nam, said on Friday that
America so threatens North Korea "it stands to reason" for it "to
equip itself with a nuclear deterrent as a legitimate self-defensive
means."
On Sunday, North Korea's army chief of staff, General Kim Yong Chun,
opened a meeting of military officers with a warning that the
country's nuclear program would speed ahead. North Korea often issues
strident warnings, many of which Washington dismisses. But the
combination of the statements and the satellite imagery have put the
White House and Pentagon on edge.
Administration officials said that even if they go to the United
Nations, the White House would not abandon the six-nation talks, which
also include Japan, South Korea, Russia and China. They said a
resolution could take several forms, including additional political
and economic sanctions, all of which North Korea says it would regard
as an act of war.
But the idea of a quarantine has attracted the most interest,
especially among administration hawks who never liked the idea of
negotiations with North Korea. The quarantine idea has been pressed by
the Pentagon and members of Vice President ***** Cheney's staff.
If approved, several officials said, it would be loosely modeled on
the one President John F. Kennedy ordered against Cuba four decades
ago. But in North Korea's case, the operation would be far more
complicated - both because of the weapons that the North may already
possess, and because the entire effort will fail if China is not a
full partner.
.
|
