North Korea says it will not discuss nuclear arms in talks with South

[Consigliere]

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said after its first talks with South Korea in more than two years that it would not discuss its nuclear weapons with Seoul because they were aimed only at the United States, not its “brethren” in South Korea.

In a joint statement after 11 hours of talks North Korea pledged to send a large delegation to next month’s Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in South Korea but made a “strong complaint” after Seoul proposed talks to denuclearize the Korean peninsula.

Officials from both sides said they agreed to meet again to resolve problems and avert accidental conflict, amid high tension over North Korea’s program to develop nuclear missiles capable of hitting the United States, but Pyongyang said disarmament would not be part of the discussions.

“All our weapons including atomic bombs, hydrogen bombs and ballistic missiles are only aimed at the United States, not our brethren, nor China and Russia,” Pyongyang’s chief negotiator, Ri Son Gwon, said.

“This is not a matter between North and South Korea, and to bring up this issue would cause negative consequences and risks turning all of today’s good achievement into nothing,” Ri, chairman of the North’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland, warned in closing remarks.

U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un have exchanged threats and insults in the past year, raising tensions on the peninsula.

A spokesperson for the White House’s national Security Council said North Korean participation in the Olympics would be “an opportunity for the regime to see the value of ending its international isolation by denuclearizing.”

The White House did not comment on the United States being the only potential target of North Korea’s nuclear weapons.

In spite of Ri’s remarks, South Korea’s Unification Ministry said it believed inter-Korean ties and a series of steps agreed in the talks on Tuesday could lead to discussion of a “fundamental resolution” of the nuclear issue in the future.

“We will closely coordinate with the United States, China, Japan and other neighbors in this process,” the ministry said in a statement.

It said South Korea had asked North Korea to halt hostile acts that stoke tension and that North had agreed that peace should be guaranteed in the region.

The North-South meeting came after a year of ramped-up North Korean missile launches and its sixth and most powerful nuclear test.

The United States, which has 28,500 troops stationed in South Korea as a legacy of the 1950-1953 Korean War, initially responded coolly to the idea of inter-Korean meetings, but Trump later called them “a good thing.”

“At the appropriate time, we’ll get involved,” he said on Saturday.

The United States has led an international campaign to step up sanctions on North Korea to press it to give up its weapons programs.

The U.N. Security Council last month unanimously imposed new sanctions on North Korea in response to its test-firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile. Pyongyang called the sanctions an act of war.

“HIGH HOPES”

Earlier on Tuesday, Seoul said it was prepared to lift some sanctions temporarily so North Koreans could visit South Korea for the Winter Olympics. North Korea said its delegation would include athletes, high-ranking officials, a cheering squad, art performers, reporters and spectators.

South Korea has unilaterally banned several North Korean officials from entry in response to Pyongyang’s missile and nuclear tests.

Talks will be held soon to work out the details of bringing the North Koreans to the Olympics, the South’s unification ministry said.

Tuesday’s talks, the first between the two Koreas since 2015, were held in the three-storey Peace House on the South Korean side of Panmunjom truce village that lies between North and South.

“We came to this meeting with the thought of giving our brethren, who have high hopes for this dialogue, invaluable results as the first present of the year,” Ri said at the start of the meeting.

Seoul said it proposed reunions of members of families divided between North and South in time for February’s Lunar New Year holiday, but the joint statement made no mention of any agreement on reunions.

North Korea has finished technical work to restore a military hotline with South Korea, Seoul said, with normal communications set to resume on Wednesday.

North Korea cut communications in February 2016, following the South’s decision to shut down a jointly run industrial park in the North.

North Korea responded “positively” to the South’s proposal for athletes from both sides to march together in the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics, Seoul said.

Athletes of the two sides have not paraded together at an international sports event since the 2007 Asian Winter Games in China.

On Tuesday, China’s Foreign Ministry said it was happy to see talks between North and South Korea and welcomed all positive steps. Russia echoed the sentiment, with a Kremlin spokesman saying: “This is exactly the kind of dialogue that we said was necessary.”

International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach said of the North-South agreement on the Pyeongchang games: “These proposals mark a great step forward in the Olympic spirit.”

The IOC would await official proposals on the number and names of athletes from the North and such matters as flag, anthem and ceremonies, he said.

 

[Fundi mahiri wa ujenzi]

Vyema

 

[MALCOM LUMUMBA]

Korean tension is similar to that of Eastern and Western Germany during the Cold-War.
On one side there is a Prosperous Germany which miraculously becomes one of the leading Capitalist nation on the planet, and yes they are backed by America. On the other side you have the most ruthless Communist state hell bent of exporting its diabolic ideology to third world countries:This Communist state has assembled one of the most pervasive and ruthless Intelligence Services on the planet, Yuri Andropov head of the KGB once commented that he was disgusted by how the STASI mistreated the Nationals of East Germany. On the other hand they had a black ops Unit Called The Red Army faction which was responsible for carrying out terror attacks through out NATO members.

But, despite all these drama to impress their masters. (The US or USSR)
The Germans always remembered one thing in their minds "They were all the descendants of the Great Holy Roman Empire"
Or The First Reich as some may choose to call it. Together they revolutionized the 19th and 20th Centuries and built a massive Empire that shook the world. In the middle of it they were bound by the Volkgeist as once put by Professor Friedrich Carl Von Savigny in his accounts on Historical Jurisprudence. (The German People belong together)

NB: America and Russia tore apart Germany, and once blood brothers were turned into worse enemies 20th Century witnessed. Whenever they pushed for reunification Big Power politics always came knocking at the door. I remember once Premier Nikita Kruschev said "Berlin is the testicle of the west, if i want the west to Scream i just squeeze on Berlin" . Eastern and Western Germany were used as mere appendages of great powers.

It was not until when Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev took the initiative to ease off the tensions Germany was reunited again. Ronald Reagan realized that his Bellicose rhetoric towards the Soviet was not going to change anything for the German people. Unlike any former US President, he chose to stretch his hands and open his eyes and see how the Russian viewed the world. Gorbachev trusted Ronald so much that he even tore down the Berlin war in 1989. (A very Bold Move but somehow awkward)

The same goes to the two Koreas,
You may hear a lot of Big Stick Diplomacy from The Kim regime,
But deep down they long for each other and that was a major reason for the Korean War of 1950-1953.
If you remember correctly it was The Americans and The Russians who divided this poor Country at the Moscow Conference in 1945. And their ideologies they tried to impose on each other is what barred the reunification of Korea.

NB: Like Germany,
The Koran People have a very great history through out Asia.
History tells us that The Koguryo Dynasty "Ancient Korea" was one among the longest surviving empire in Asia apart from Zhou Dynasty.The Formidable Koguryo survived for 700 consecutive years. Always standing tall and rejuvenating itself militarily.
It was powerful enough to fight off the The Han, The Wei, and The Tang Dynasties of Ancient China within different generations of time and managed to emerge victorious. And in some occasions the Korean people fought off the Japanese invasion and dominated the whole Korean Peninsula, to the extent even the Mighty Chinese cowered at the presence of the Baekje Dynasty or Koguryo Dynasty. (If you meet any Korean Scholar, this is a portion of history they can never forget)

I applaud the efforts taken by President Moon Jae-In to try to resume the long forgotten negotiations with North Korea. But these talks will never come to fruition if the Big Powers such as China, Russia, Japan and USA don't reach a consensus which would alter the fate of the whole Peninsula. This would include;

• America guaranteeing the Security of North Korea. (No more threats, No more Sanctions)
• Both Koreas to be required to sign a Peace Treaty to end the Korean War as a sign of Good Will. This will be similar to tearing down the Berlin War. I believe this will be one among the factors that would help end an awful spectre of war looming since the end of the Korean War of 1953. (The Korean War never ended, they only signed an armistice on 1953. So technically the two Koreas are at War since 1950)
• America must explicitly recognize and acknowledge the Security and Economic interests of China within the Korean Peninsula. And from the lessons the Chinese learned from President Gorbachev and Yeltsin, it will be very hard for them to trust Americans unless Americans choose to walk an extra mile on this.

If America chooses to refrain from doing anything Irrational all the major powers such as Japan and Australia will have no stand than to walk away. Vice versa is true to China whose decisions have a great likelihood of influencing major powers like Russia and Iran.....

NB: In the near future i believe that China and America should be included as observers in the peace process.
They should not dictate terms but rather have a supervisory and advisory roles. Their presence in the meeting can have a great impact within the Security Council.....
The big powers should talk the talk and walk the walk....

CC: Consigliere , neo1