Roh during his inauguration

KUALA LUMPUR, February 25 (News Agencies) - North Korea Tuesday, February 25, defended its decision to pull out of a key nuclear arms treaty, saying it had been forced to act because of threats from the United States.

Pyongyang's number two leader, Supreme People's Assembly president Kim Yong Nam, told the summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) that "at this stage" its nuclear activities would be confined to peaceful purposes, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

His remarks came a day after Pyongyang's firing of a missile triggered a regional tension, sparking a military alert in South Korea and criticism at the summit.

A South Korean defence ministry official said there were no details immediately available about the type of missile fired, or about its range.

North Korea agreed to a moratorium on missile testing after it caused international alarm in 1998 when it test-fired a Taepodong ballistic missile that flew over north-eastern Japan into the Pacific Ocean.

Kim told the NAM summit that North Korea "was compelled to decide to withdraw from the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons (NPT) to cope with the grave situation in which its supreme interests are extremely threatened by the reckless U.S. policy."

Although Pyongyang had taken this action, "its nuclear activities at this stage would be confined only to the peaceful purposes such as the production of electricity," he said, referring to a government statement issued on January 10.

Kim said the nuclear issue was the "product of the deep-rooted hostile policy pursued by the U.S. for more than half a century in order to isolate and stifle the DPRK."

The crisis could only be resolved by negotiations between the two countries and the conclusion of a non-aggression treaty, he said.

Indonesia, whose President Megawati Sukarnoputri has offered to mediate in the stand-off, urged North Korea to exercise self-restraint.

"We haven't yet found any mechanisms that can bring parties of the conflict to the dialogue table. Now the firing of the missiles would certainly complicate the problem," Malaysian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda told reporters on the sidelines of the NAM summit.

Pyongyang has long rejected international involvement in what it considers a dispute between it and the United States alone.

Chile's envoy to the United Nations, where it currently has a non-permanent seat on the Security Council, Claudio Rojas, said NAM members had appealed to North Korea to reconsider its withdrawal from the NPT and would "lament" the missile firing.

Earlier, however, NAM negotiators backed down from an attempt to pressure North Korea to reverse its decision to quit the NPT, which seeks to limit possession of nuclear weapons to the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain.

Instead, a resolution to be presented at the end of the summit Tuesday says the leaders simply "noted the withdrawal of the DPRK (North Korea) from the NPT," according to a final draft obtained by AFP.

The NAM resolution expresses "serious concern over the recent developments on the Korean Peninsula" and calls "upon all parties concerned to do everything possible to resolve the nuclear issue peacefully."

The North Korean issue temporarily knocked the crisis over Iraq from the top of the NAM agenda, but it was due to surface again later in the day when Iraq's Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan addresses the summit.

NAM, which consists mainly of developing countries and has been meeting since 1961, was conceived as an alternative to the Eastern and Western blocs during the Cold War.

Meanwhile, South Korea's new President Roh Moo-Hyun warned North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons drive in his inauguration speech here Tuesday, February 25 as Pyongyang marked the occasion by test-firing a missile into the sea of Japan.

Roh, 56, outlined his vision for keeping the peace on the Korean peninsula which included a warning to North Korea that its nuclear weapons drive cannot be tolerated.

"The suspicion that North Korea is developing nuclear weapons poses a grave threat to world peace," said the president, hours after Pyongyang's missile launch put South Korea's armed forces on alert and alarmed neighbouring Japan, reported AFP.

It was the latest in a string of incidents involving North Korea that have raised tension in the four-month-old nuclear crisis on the Korean peninsula.

Roh, who says his top priority is to resolve the crisis peacefully, spelt out the benefits the reclusive regime can expect to receive in international recognition, support and aid if it renounces its weapons drive.

"It is up to Pyongyang whether to go ahead and obtain nuclear weapons or to get guarantees for the security of its regime and international economic support," he said.

Roh also called for change in the 50-year-old alliance with the United States, and stressed his commitment to his predecessor Kim Dae-Jung's policy of engagement with the Stalinist North, branded part of an "axis of evil" last year by U.S. President George W. Bush.

Roh believes that North Korea, a bankrupt Stalinist state dubbed an "outlaw" nation last month by Bush, should be treated as a partner, not as a criminal.
Washington maintains that giving anything to North Korea amounts to rewarding bad behavior and Bush insists he will never back down to Pyongyang's nuclear "blackmail."

Roh beat Washington's favourite Lee Hoi-Chang -- a 67-year-old conservative -- by two percentage points in the December 19 poll, helped by a wave of anti-American sentiment that brought hundreds of thousands of Koreans onto the streets late last year.

A novice on international affairs who has never visited the United States, Roh wants to wean Seoul away from its reliance on Washington and to push for a bigger role for Seoul in resolving the four-month-old standoff with the North.

"We will see to it that the alliance matures into a more reciprocal and equitable relationship," said Roh in a ceremony attended by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, with whom he held talks on the North Korean crisis later in the day.

Roh opposes Washington's hardline policy on North Korea, saying dialogue and economic exchanges are the only way to resolve the crisis that can only deepen if North Korea is further isolated.

Washington has not ruled out either sanctions or military action, though pledging to resolve the standoff through peaceful means, at least for now.

But Roh distanced himself somewhat from his predecessor's policy of engagement with the North, which has been branded appeasement by critics. His equivalent, which he has dubbed his 'peace and prosperity' policy, will be based on reciprocity and on a broader consensus of the people, he said.