SEOUL, South Korea (AP) – The top US diplomat on Wednesday criticized North Korea’s human rights record and reiterated its vow to withdraw the country from its nuclear program, a day after Pyongyang warned Washington that “refrain from stinking” amid blocked nuclear talks. .
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in South Korea on Wednesday earlier with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin as part of the regional tour aimed at pushing U.S. Asian alliances to better meet the challenges growing numbers from China and North Korea.
“North Korea’s authoritarian regime continues to commit systematic and widespread abuses against its own people,” Blinken said at the beginning of his meeting with South Korean Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong. “We must stand by the people who demand their fundamental rights and freedoms and against those who repress them.”
Blinken called North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs “a threat to the region and to the world.” He said the United States will work with South Korea, Japan and other allies to achieve the denuclearization of North Korea.
The way to get North Korea back to the talks was surely the main focus of the meetings between Blinken and Austin and South Korean officials.
When Austin met separately with his South Korean counterpart Suh Wook on Wednesday, he said the alliance of his countries “has never been more important” given “the unprecedented challenges posed by” North Korea and China. .
The two top U.S. officials will hold a joint “two plus two” meeting with Chung and Suh on Thursday in the first such contact between the two countries in five years.
U.S.-led diplomacy over North Korea’s nuclear program has been on the brink since a February 2019 summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un collapsed over disputes over sanctions led by US leaders. United States. Kim has threatened to expand its nuclear arsenal in protest of what he called US hostility.
On Tuesday, Kim’s sister and a senior official, Kim Yo Jong, spoke out against the United States over its ongoing military exercises with South Korea, which North Korea considers an invasion attempt.
“We take this opportunity to warn the new US administration,” Kim Yo Jong said in a statement. “If you want to sleep peacefully for the next four years, you better refrain from stinking on your first step.”
Some experts say Kim Yo Jong’s statement was a pressure tactic and that Pyongyang could try to increase further animosities with gun tests to increase its leverage in future negotiations with Washington.
North Korea did not immediately react to Blinken’s comments on Wednesday.
While in Tokyo on Tuesday, Blinken said Washington reached North Korea through various channels as of mid-February, but has received no response. He said the Biden administration hoped to complete the review of its policy on North Korea in the coming weeks and was looking at both possible “additional pressure measures” and “diplomatic channels”.
Blinken and Austin also joined forces with Japanese officials to criticize China’s “coercion and aggression” and reaffirm their commitment to rid North Korea of all its nuclear weapons.
China said Wednesday that the statement by the United States and Japan “maliciously attacked” its foreign policy and seriously interfered in China’s internal affairs. Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said China was “strongly dissatisfied and decidedly opposed” to the statement.
North Korea’s arsenal is believed to grow amid blocked diplomacy, experts debate whether the United States and its allies should settle for an agreement that would freeze North Korea’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relaxing and would possibly leave Pyongyang’s already-manufactured nuclear weapons. in place.
Shin Beomchul, an analyst at Korea-based National Strategy Research Institute in Seoul, said he expects the Biden administration to maintain an agreement with North Korea that resembles a 2015 agreement that goes freeze Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions.
While the United States is unlikely to give up its long-term commitment to North Korea’s denuclearization, reducing the country’s nuclear capabilities to zero is not a realistic short-term diplomatic goal, he said.
Trump exploited that 2015 Obama administration deal in favor of what he called maximum pressure against Iran, and the Biden government is trying to resurrect it.
In a 2018 New York Times publication, Blinken, then managing director of the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement, argued that the best deal the U.S. could reach for North Korea “is very likely to look like Barack Obama. achieved with Iran “. He said an interim agreement “would gain time to negotiate a broader agreement, including a meticulously sequenced roadmap that would require sustained diplomacy. This is the approach Mr Obama took with Iran.”
Other experts say a deal in Iran will not work for North Korea. Iran has not built any bombs, but North Korea has already made dozens. They say North Korea, which has a track record of derailing agreements with its vehement rejection of verification processes, will find no reason to denuclearize when some of the most painful sanctions are lifted.
“Everyone can easily say that (settling for) a nuclear freeze would allow North Korea to preserve its existing nuclear weapons. But I ask them what other options they have “to realize North Korea’s denuclearization,” said Kim Yeol Soo, an analyst at the South Korean Institute of Military Affairs.
Another possible issue during this week’s US-South Korea talks is whether South Korea should actively participate in U.S.-led efforts to curb China’s increasing strength in the region.
South Korea is a long-standing American ally and hosts about 28,500 American soldiers. But its economy is heavily dependent on trade with China, making it difficult to take any steps that are considered provocative for its largest trading partner.
Suh, South Korea’s defense minister, said Tuesday that the United States had not formally proposed that South Korea join an expanded format of the so-called “Quad” group that includes the United States, Japan, Australia and India, and it is likely that Americans will not make that proposal during this week’s talks.