Written evidence submitted by Mark Fitzpatrick,
International Institute for Strategic Studies
KOREAN PENINSULA TENSIONS
Six Party Talks
1. Notwithstanding the success of the Six-Party
Talks in producing a Joint Statement of principles on19 September
2005, the crisis over North Korea's nuclear program continues
to deepen. A key sticking point has been the insistence by the
Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on the right to nuclear
energy. From the beginning of the Six-Party Talks, the United
States held that North Korea, having violated the NPT, had no
right to any nuclear program. As the talks reached a climax in
September, however, the US found itself in a minority on that
issue, and rather than be seen as the party responsible for scuttling
the talks, conceded that provision of a LWR would be discussed
"at an appropriate time". The DPRK, for its part, committed
to "abandoning all nuclear weapons and its existing nuclear
programs" and to return to the NPT. A disagreement over sequencing
erupted almost immediately, when the United States, as the result
of an internal debate over the compromise on LWRs, issued a statement
parsing "appropriate time" to mean when North Korea
complies with the NPT and "has demonstrated a sustained commitment
to cooperation and transparency"—a subjective criterion
of which the US would be the judge. The next day, the DPRK announced
that it would not implement the joint statement until the US provided
a reactor.
Controlling North Korean illicit activities
2. Soon thereafter, Pyongyang boycotted
the talks over Washington's steps to reign in North Korean illicit
activities. In October, the US Treasury Department sanctioned
the Macao-based Banco Delta Asia (BDA) bank for money-laundering
associated with North Korea's black market dealings. The same
month, the Treasury Department, under a separate authority, designated
eight North Korean companies as having been involved in the proliferation
of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery vehicles. The
latter action froze any assets the companies had under US jurisdiction
and prohibited US persons from doing business with them. The action
against BDA caused a run on the bank and resulted in the freezing
of 50 North Korean accounts. Under US pressure, a number of other
banks around the world restricted business with the DPRK so as
not to draw US Treasury sanctions themselves. American officials
saw these measures as the perfect sanction, targeting North Korea's
leaders but not its general public.
3. The financial measures were carried out
without heed for the impact on the negotiations, as the Bush Administration
followed bifurcated policy tracks. Hardliners saw little purpose
in the negotiations and little chance of success, believing that
DPRK leader Kim Jong Il would never give up the nuclear weapon
program unless the future of his regime were at stake. Opposed
to offering any incentives that they would prop up the regime,
the hardliners saw financial sanctions as a means of putting pressure
on it instead. They also note that illicit profits could contribute
to the financing of North Korean missile and nuclear weapons programs.
The same networks used for criminal transactions can potentially
be used for WMD transfers. Closing down those networks and depriving
the state of the profits is one of the few practical ways in which
Washington can contain North Korea's weapons programmes.
4. The Proliferation Security Initiative
was also designed largely to contain North Korea. In the absence
of any known PSI-related interdiction of a WMD-laden North Korean
ship, it is hard to substantiate PSI success, although undoubtedly
there has been a deterrent effect. Combined with steps to stop
North Korea's illicit activity, PSI is also a display of muscle
that can give leverage to diplomacy—and demonstrate that
Washington has more options at its disposal than simply negotiations
or military action.
North Korea's arsenal
5. As Washington turns up the screws, however,
Pyongyang continues to build up its nuclear arsenal. Last year
North Korea completed reprocessing spent fuel newly extracted
form its small research reactor at Yongbyon, producing enough
plutonium for another 1-2 nuclear bombs. This was added to an
arsenal that was already considered to have grown to 4-9, compared
to the 1-2 weapons worth of plutonium estimated to be in North
Korea's hands in 2001 at the start of the Bush Administration.
North Korea also told visitors it was resuming construction of
the two power reactors on which work was halted under the 1994
Agreed Framework. One of them conceivably could be completed in
a few years, at which time it would be able to produce 56 kg of
plutonium a year, enough for another 5-10 nuclear weapons.
6. The DPRK also continues to develop intermediate
and long-range missiles that potentially could carry nuclear weapons.
In March 2006, North Korea repeated that it had atomic weapons
to counter the US nuclear threat, and claimed it had the ability
to launch a pre-emptive attack on the United States. North Korea
has abided by the voluntary moratorium on medium and long-range
missile tests it undertook after its 1998 test of a 2,000-km range
Taepodong missile with a trajectory toward Japan. Meanwhile, however,
North Korea also continues to market its dangerous ballistic missile
technology, particularly to Iran.
South Korea-US divergence
7. US pressure on North Korea has strengthened,
the consensus among the other five parties to the talks has weakened,
as evidenced in the increasingly divergent set of threat perceptions
and security priorities between the US and South Korea. Where
Americans see an increasingly dangerous and repressive evil regime
in the northern half of the peninsula, South Koreans see a pitiable
renegade brother, estranged by an accident of history in which
America was culpable. South Korea's priorities have been regional
peace, regional prosperity, engagement and eventual long-term
unification with the DPRK. In contrast, the Bush administration's
priorities are to counter the dual threat of terrorism and proliferation
and to promote democracy.
8. South Korea's increasing eagerness to
invest in and trade with North Korea is decidedly discordant with
Washington's policy of applying financial pressure. Trade between
the two Koreas exceeded $1 billion in 2005, up from $700 million
in 2004 and spurred by the joint North South Korean industrial
park in Kaesong. South Korea's motivations are not purely commercial.
Watching Beijing's energetic economic efforts to woo North Korea,
the Seoul realizes that if it does not keep pace, it will lose
out in the race to control the Korean peninsula. In Seoul's view,
the future of the peninsula is a united country along the South
Korean free market model. Knowing that China has no interest in
seeing a Western-oriented united Korea on its border, Seoul fears
that a dominant Chinese influence in the North could keep the
peninsula divided.
China-North Korean ties
9. Opposing efforts to put pressure on North
Korea, Beijing takes a longer run approach to influencing Pyongyang
through trade and economic reforms. There is no mistaking the
deep and extensive nature of the relationship between the two
countries. Chinese annual investment and trade with North Korea
rose to $2 billion in 2005, revitalizing ports, building factories
and modernizing the energy sector. President Hu Jin Tao visited
Pyongyang in October and hosted Kim Jong Il in January 2006, both
times pressing the message of managed reform along the Chinese
model. Kim apparently got the point. Following his visit, which
included visits to Shenzhen and other southern cities famous for
their export-led wealth, the North Korean news agency for the
first time gave an unreserved favorable commentary on China's
opening and reform.
Future prospects
10. Under Chinese pressure, the DPRK is
likely to return to the Six-Party Talks eventually. If talks do
resume, however, they are unlikely to produce much of consequence
and are likely quickly to run into trouble over verification.
The US will demand intrusive inspections that go against the very
grain of North Korea's secretive society: American-led teams having
the right to go anywhere at any time, necessary because the US
does not know where the uranium enrichment facilities are. Verification
measures will be even more difficult than they were between the
US and Soviet Union in the Cold War, when verification was two-sided.
More fundamentally, the two protagonists have no willingness to
offer fundamental compromises. North Korea will not give up its
nuclear deterrent without a tangible, irreversible assurance of
`no hostile intent', and the only tangible assurance it seems
willing to settle for is a light water reactor. The Bush Administration
will not be party to providing a nuclear reactor. It believes
North Korea will not give up its nuclear weapons for any inducement,
unless the survival of the regime is at stake. Hence, pressure
through financial measures is deemed useful not only for containing
North Korea but as part of a longer-term strategy of putting pressure
on the regime.
* Mark Fitzpatrick is Senior Fellow for
Non-Proliferation at the International Institute for Strategic
Studies and previously served for 26 years in the US Department
of State, including as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for
Nonproliferation Export Controls.
7 May 2006
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