US says no deadline, concessions for North Korea

SEOUL - The United States has not set a deadline for North Korea to return to stalled nuclear talks and will not offer concessions to bring it back to the table, the chief US negotiator said on Monday.

US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian Affairs Christopher Hill said in an interview he was reluctant to put a deadline on North Korea's return to the talks but that options were being considered in case they fell through.

"A time will come when we have to decide whether this is the right option and whether we have to look at other options," Hill said. "One option we don't have is to walk away. We have got to figure out how to solve this problem."

"I am really reluctant to put a deadline out there, especially an artificial deadline," Hill told Reuters at the US embassy in Seoul, where he has been ambassador for less than a year. It was his first interview in his new role.

Security analysts have said patience in Washington is wearing thin for Pyongyang to return to the talks, aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear programs, and recent rhetoric from the North to turn the process into comprehensive nuclear disarmament talks for the whole Korean peninsula had only made tensions worse.

Pyongyang has asked for a US apology for calling it an outpost of tyranny. There has been speculation in diplomatic circles that Washington may have to offer sweeteners, such as considering diplomatic relations with Pyongyang, to get the six-party process rolling again.

"We are not going to make concessions for the purpose of bringing them back to the talks," he said.

Hill said North Korea, with its anemic economy and chronic food shortages, has a host of problems that cannot be solved by having atomic weapons programs.

"It is a shame that so much of our diplomatic efforts are engaged in an extremely underdeveloped country that is not producing food for its people, but which seems to be in the production of extremely dangerous weapons," Hill said.

He commented on media speculation the North had exported uranium hexafluoride, which can be used to make nuclear weapons material, through a network set up by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb program. The material ended up in Libya.

Proliferation experts said if North Korea sold nuclear material directly to Libya, it would have crossed an important threshold by spreading the material to what was considered a rogue state. Libya has since halted its nuclear program.
TROUBLE CHARTING COURSE

"In the Libya case, there was some material, where the origin we have every reason to believe came from North Korea, albeit brokered, but the material ended up in Libya," Hill said.

Hill said he was not aware of other cases where the North has exported nuclear weapons material but he added "one has to see a pattern of their behavior."

"I believe that we have a regime in North Korea that has trouble in figuring out on how to draw the line and has been involved in all sorts of illicit exports. I believe that proliferation is a reason to be concerned," Hill said.

On Feb. 10, North Korea declared for the first time it possessed nuclear weapons and it also said it was pulling out of the six-party talks. The talks bring together the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States.

Hill said he would like to meet soon with his counterparts in the process and said China, the North's main benefactor, has a distinct role in moving the talks forward.

"The Chinese have a special onus on them because they are the host," he said.

A US expert on North Korea who met with leaders of the reclusive state last week said Pyongyang is taking an increasing hard-line stance on its nuclear ambitions.

Selig Harrison, of the Washington-based Center for International Policy, told reporters in Beijing after his trip that North Korea is not prepared to discuss dismantling its nuclear weapons until it has normalized all diplomatic and economic relations with the United States.

Hill urged the North to return to talks.

"The problem is that we have a North Korean regime that has difficulties at times identifying their own interests and they have difficulties at times charting their course," Hill said.- REUTERS