North Korea will respond to diplomatic pressure and abandon its
nuclear weapons ambitions as it seeks to open up to the outside
world, South Korean president-elect Roh Moo-Hyun said Friday as a
top Russian envoy headed for Pyongyang.
Roh, who takes office on February 25, said fears that unpredictable North Korea would resort to armed force in its standoff with the world community over it nuclear weapons were misplaced.
"North Korea does not have the military capability to resolve any issue through its armed forces and North Korea knows this fact very well," Roh told foreign businessmen here.
"I think the problem can be resolved through dialogue because North Korea is sincere about its willingness to open up and reform, because it has no other choice." The president-elect, champion of engagement with the reclusive Stalinist regime that has ratcheted up tension in the region for the past three months, said that a concerted diplomatic drive would eventually bear fruit.
"If we consistently talk to North Korea, North Korea will give up its nuclear ambitions," said the 56-year-old liberal leader who has opposed a hard-line drive led by Washington to coerce Pyongyang into scrapping its nuclear drive.
However, a day earlier South Korea's Defense Minister Lee Jun said that the country had to be ready for war in case the diplomatic process broke down in a "worst case scenario."
China, which has offered to host reconciliation talks between Washington and Pyongyang, was the staging post Friday for another key diplomatic drive led by Alexander Losyukov, Russia's deputy foreign minister and special presidential envoy.
He has been entrusted by Russian President Vladimir Putin to put forward a Moscow-brokered resolution to the crisis when he visits Pyongyang on Saturday after going over the proposal Friday with China's Vice Foreign Minister Yang Wenchang.
"It is necessary to give quiet diplomacy an opportunity to work," he told reporters at the airport on arrival in the Chinese capital a day after US envoy James Kelly left.
Beijing has said it hopes the Russian envoy's "mediation will work" and that it was willing to cooperate on efforts to resolve the standoff.
"China is willing to exert joint efforts with related sides and push for the early resolution of the DPRK (North Korea) nuclear issue," said foreign ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue.
China and Russia are North Korea's closest allies and are considered perhaps the only countries with any influence over the hermetic state.
The Russian plan, already winning international support according to Moscow, envisages ensuring the nuclear-free status of the Korean peninsula and reviving the collapsed 1994 US-North Korean Agreed Framework deal which froze Pyongyang's nuclear program in return for energy aid.
It also proposes measures to guarantee North Korea's security as well as economic assistance for the famine-hit Stalinist state.
Kelly left Beijing Thursday after talks with Chinese ministers while Japan's Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi met with South Korean president-elect Roh Moo-Hyun. United Nations and Australian delegations are currently in North Korea.
But the massive diplomatic mobilization has so far seen no tangible progress in the three-month-old standoff that stemmed from US revelations in October that North Korea admitted it was running a nuclear weapons programme in breach of the 1994 arms control accord.
Pyongyang followed up by expelling UN nuclear monitors and withdrawing from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The North has said it is now making preparations to reactivate a nuclear plant that had been mothballed under the Agreed Framework, after Washington suspended fuel aid that was part of the 1994 deal.
President-elect Roh's reassuring remarks came as mixed messages emerged from the South Korea capital about prospects for a resolution of the nuclear standoff.
Defense Minister Lee said the nation's 650,000-strong military would be ready to respond if diplomacy failed and the conservative JoongAng newspaper reported that US and South Korean military commanders were working on a new war plan as tension mounted.
An influential South Korean government-funded think tank meanwhile said that Seoul might have to resort to military muscle, according to Yonhap news agency.
The Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security, affiliated with the foreign ministry, said military and economic pressure would be needed if North Korea failed to recognize the gravity of the situation, Yonhap said - Sapa-AFP
Roh, who takes office on February 25, said fears that unpredictable North Korea would resort to armed force in its standoff with the world community over it nuclear weapons were misplaced.
"North Korea does not have the military capability to resolve any issue through its armed forces and North Korea knows this fact very well," Roh told foreign businessmen here.
"I think the problem can be resolved through dialogue because North Korea is sincere about its willingness to open up and reform, because it has no other choice." The president-elect, champion of engagement with the reclusive Stalinist regime that has ratcheted up tension in the region for the past three months, said that a concerted diplomatic drive would eventually bear fruit.
"If we consistently talk to North Korea, North Korea will give up its nuclear ambitions," said the 56-year-old liberal leader who has opposed a hard-line drive led by Washington to coerce Pyongyang into scrapping its nuclear drive.
However, a day earlier South Korea's Defense Minister Lee Jun said that the country had to be ready for war in case the diplomatic process broke down in a "worst case scenario."
China, which has offered to host reconciliation talks between Washington and Pyongyang, was the staging post Friday for another key diplomatic drive led by Alexander Losyukov, Russia's deputy foreign minister and special presidential envoy.
He has been entrusted by Russian President Vladimir Putin to put forward a Moscow-brokered resolution to the crisis when he visits Pyongyang on Saturday after going over the proposal Friday with China's Vice Foreign Minister Yang Wenchang.
"It is necessary to give quiet diplomacy an opportunity to work," he told reporters at the airport on arrival in the Chinese capital a day after US envoy James Kelly left.
Beijing has said it hopes the Russian envoy's "mediation will work" and that it was willing to cooperate on efforts to resolve the standoff.
"China is willing to exert joint efforts with related sides and push for the early resolution of the DPRK (North Korea) nuclear issue," said foreign ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue.
China and Russia are North Korea's closest allies and are considered perhaps the only countries with any influence over the hermetic state.
The Russian plan, already winning international support according to Moscow, envisages ensuring the nuclear-free status of the Korean peninsula and reviving the collapsed 1994 US-North Korean Agreed Framework deal which froze Pyongyang's nuclear program in return for energy aid.
It also proposes measures to guarantee North Korea's security as well as economic assistance for the famine-hit Stalinist state.
Kelly left Beijing Thursday after talks with Chinese ministers while Japan's Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi met with South Korean president-elect Roh Moo-Hyun. United Nations and Australian delegations are currently in North Korea.
But the massive diplomatic mobilization has so far seen no tangible progress in the three-month-old standoff that stemmed from US revelations in October that North Korea admitted it was running a nuclear weapons programme in breach of the 1994 arms control accord.
Pyongyang followed up by expelling UN nuclear monitors and withdrawing from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The North has said it is now making preparations to reactivate a nuclear plant that had been mothballed under the Agreed Framework, after Washington suspended fuel aid that was part of the 1994 deal.
President-elect Roh's reassuring remarks came as mixed messages emerged from the South Korea capital about prospects for a resolution of the nuclear standoff.
Defense Minister Lee said the nation's 650,000-strong military would be ready to respond if diplomacy failed and the conservative JoongAng newspaper reported that US and South Korean military commanders were working on a new war plan as tension mounted.
An influential South Korean government-funded think tank meanwhile said that Seoul might have to resort to military muscle, according to Yonhap news agency.
The Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security, affiliated with the foreign ministry, said military and economic pressure would be needed if North Korea failed to recognize the gravity of the situation, Yonhap said - Sapa-AFP
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