The United States is against giving North Korea a grace period before it dismantles its nuclear arms program, the top US envoy to talks aimed at ending Pyongyang’s atomic weapons drive said Wednesday.
Christopher Hill said he had rejected a demand by Pyongyang for an interim period allowing a freeze of their nuclear operations ahead of the dismantlement.
“I am not interested in having a discussion with them about freezing this operation,” Hill said, citing a US-North Korea accord in 1994 which Pyongyang allegedly reneged on after agreeing to freeze its nuclear program in exchange for energy assistance and other concessions.
“I have just told the North Koreans … (they) raised the idea (of) what can be done about putting the interim measure, a freeze measure. I told them I am not interested,” Hill said at a forum organized by the United States Institute of Peace on an accord reached at the six-party talks in Beijing this month.
Under the “Statement of Principles” agreed to at the talks, North Korea agreed in principle to disband its nuclear weapons network in return for security guarantees and energy aid.
The talks between the United States, the two Koreas, Russia, China and Japan would resume in early November to discuss verification and other measures following North Korea’s pledge to dismantle its atomic activities.
North Korea’s violation of the 1994 Agreed Framework triggered a nuclear crisis in October 2002, when the United States accused Pyongyang of running a secret uranium-enrichment program.
North Korea denied the claims, but responded by throwing out international inspectors and withdrawing from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
In February this year North Korea admitted having built nuclear weapons.
Hill said the 1994 talks were “not to negotiate a freeze but a dimantlement and yet freeze took up most of the negotiating time as it turned out.”
The United States, he said, was aware that North Korea was continuing with its nuclear weapons program as part of its bargaining stance.
The Institute for Science and International Security, a Washington-based think tank, recently released satellite photos showing that the North’s main nuclear reactor at Yongbyon was operating — a sign that Pyongyang could still produce weapons-grade plutonium.
“We know what they are producing, we can measure it very clearly and under the agreement they have to give it all up,” Hill said, adding that North Korea was “wasting their time.”
“You can see that keeping this operating is for the purpose, I guess, of trying to enhance the bargaining position,” he said. “I am not impressed.”
“If I were they, just shut the thing down.”
