UN envoy warns of “serious and ominous” risks the North Korea crisis could escalate

WASHINGTON, January 18 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – In a new maneuver to get out of a three-month-old standoff, the United States might issue a non-aggression policy statement with North Korea if Pyongyang abandons its nuclear ambitions.

But the statement is still far away from the non-aggression pact North Korea asked for as a condition to give up its nuclear arms program, leaving prospects for an “serious and ominous” risk of escalation, still rising higher with the return of UN envoy from the Stalinist state.

The U.S. Congress would not pass any treaty of non-aggression with North Korea, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said in an interview with Japanese journalists Friday, January 17.

However, he said the United States may issue a statement promising to secure the regime of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, and reiterated Washington wants to resolve the nuclear standoff peacefully through diplomacy, not war.

"We have recently spoken out that we have no hostile intentions," Armitage was quoted by Kyodo News as telling Japanese journalists.

"We are not going to invade North Korea. We believe that there is a way to document this, whether an exchange of letters or official statement, something like that," he said.

Armitage, however, stressed the need for a comprehensive security deal with North Korea, covering its uranium-enrichment and plutonium-extracting capabilities as well as chemical and conventional weapons, Agence-France Presse (AFP) reported.

“We found out now that North Korea has highly enriched uranium facility which they are pursuing," Armitage said. "Any new arrangement would have to capture also the highly enriched uranium facility as well.   

"We desire also having discussions with North Koreans about conventional military threats, entire WMD (weapons of mass destruction) arsenal to include chemical weapons," he said, adding Washington may propose to construct thermal power plants in place of light-water nuclear reactors in North Korea.

Risks Still "Serious and Ominous"    

But the UN envoy warned of a "serious and ominous" risk the North Korean nuclear crisis could escalate after returning from Pyongyang.

Maurice Strong, special envoy of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan who arrived in Beijing Saturday, January 18, after a four-day mission to the hermit state, said things could get worse unless the two sides started trusting each other.

"There is a serious and ominous risk that this crisis could escalate," he told reporters.   

"If it does, it would escalate, to my view, unnecessarily, because the positions of the parties as they have articulated them are actually quite close to each other," he said.

North Korea wants a peaceful resolution to the stand-off, and the core problem now is "a breakdown of trust and communication" with the United States, he said.   

"Both parties seem to be saying somewhat closely what the other one wants. And yet they are talking past each other, rather than to each other," he said.  

Strong, who reportedly held talks with the North Korean regime's number two Kim Yong-Nam, also warned that eight million North Koreans were facing a life or death humanitarian situation.   

"The humanitarian crisis is a real crisis, it's not just a potential crisis," he said. "It is a crisis affecting the lives and the prospects of some six to eight million people."  

 The plight of the people of the impoverished nation must not be used as a political football, he said.  

 "You cannot make the children, the ill people, the old people victims of a political crisis with which they have had nothing to do," he said.

Strong said North Korea made it clear to him they had no plans to acquire nuclear weapons and were willing to talk.  

 "They said to me what they have been saying publicly, that they have no intention of trying to acquire or manufacture nuclear weapons," he said.   

"They believe they themselves are threatened by the world's main nuclear power (the United States) and they themselves are quite prepared as part of a settlement to renounce any desire or intention to acquire nuclear weapons and to subject themselves to inspections."

Diplomatic Gestures

However, as the situation seems moving to the worst, the U.S. has come with new assurances of the keenness to hammer out a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

"We are not looking for a crisis. We are not looking for a war. We have no hostile intent toward North Korea," Powell said in an interview with foreign reporters.

There have been mounting signs that Washington is considering a new deal with the unpredictable North Korean regime.

But Powell emphasized the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency remained "concerned" that North Korea has violated its obligations to give up its nuclear program under a 1994 accord.

On the other hand, the U.S. promises not to invade North Korea contradict with the U.S. continued vows to launch a military action against Iraq, another member of the axis of evil, and allow its military to rule the Arab country for months, reportedly to protect its oil fields and prevent rival factions from tearing the country apart.

Pyongyang’s Reluctance

But the American efforts to tone down the inflammatory conflict met with more defiance from Pyongyang, which called for unity of all Koreans and accused the United States of seeking to drive a wedge between Seoul and Pyongyang, as the two Koreas prepare to engage in a busy week of talks

"It is an issue of particular importance to achieve great national unity now that the U.S. imperialists seek to deprive the South Koreans of their sovereignty, hinder the implementation of the June 15 North-South joint declaration and enslave the Korean nation," said Rodong Sinmun, the official daily of North Korea's ruling Korean Workers Party.

The June 15 declaration, signed by South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung and North Korea's leader Kim Jong-Il in 2000, calls for both Koreas to moving toward peace and reconciliation.

"It is high time that all the fellow countrymen united close under the banner of 'by our nation itself,' ... because a very serious situation is prevailing on the Korean peninsula due to the US imperialists' moves," it said