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CNN SUNDAY MORNING
Bush Administration Sends Envoy to South Korea
Aired January 12, 2003 - 09:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's get back to our top story, the high stakes diplomatic mission to the Korean peninsula. Washington envoy James Kelly is in Seoul this hour as North Korea hones an even sharper edge to its rejection of a nuclear ban. Pyongyang now says it may restart missile testing. CNN senior White House correspondent John King joining us from Washington. John, good morning, good to have you with us.
JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Miles. Certainly a resumption of North Korean missile testing would be of grave concern to the United States, but even more so to South Korea and Japan. That's one of the reasons Assistant Secretary of State Kelly is in the region. He'll meet with South Korea's president-elect, other Korean officials.
Priority number one, you might say, is getting South Korea and the United States on the same page. The United States has so far taken a relatively tough approach, saying it will talk with North Korea, but not negotiate. And that before there can be any concessions from the United States, North Korea must give up that nuclear weapons program.
South Korea has asked for a more gentle approach, if you will, and says there should be dialogue, all issues, like security assurances, like perhaps economic aid down the road should be on the table. So as the Bush administration decides how to proceed and you see Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly there, the number one priority might be getting all the allies on the same page. That is one of the reasons for his mission to Seoul.
The United States also digesting a report from New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson. He was the United Nations ambassador during the Clinton administration. He had nearly three days of talks with North Korean diplomats in New Mexico. That is not officially representing the Bush administration, but the Bush administration certainly eager to hear what governor, former Ambassador Richardson has to say. The United States again says it will sit down and talk directly with North Korea, but it says no concessions. The North Koreans so far have said that North Korea doesn't view that to be an offer in good faith.
The big question, Miles, where do we go from here? And as the administration decides just what that should be, there's still a debate within the administration, is all this bluster? Is North Korea threatening an aggressive nuclear program just to get negotiations, just to get the United States to the table, or does it see India, see Pakistan, and has it decided that it wants to be a nuclear nation? That is one of the questions still not answered.
O'BRIEN: Some ham-handed tactics, no matter which way you slice it. I am curious, John, trying to sort out this rhetoric. When you hear from ambassador, now Governor Richardson, he comes out of those talks with Ambassador Han and he says the Koreans tell me they have no plans to build a bomb. And then you hear what's coming out of the official media out of Pyongyang, talking about a sea of fire and a holy war against the United States. It's pretty hard to reconcile those two things.
KING: And that is one of the problems. The North Korean regime is perhaps the most unpredictable on the planet, if you talk to State Department officials, and they see all this rhetoric about a nuclear confrontation, about a war, about deaths, about destruction and devastation on the Korean peninsula. It is hard to sift through what is just confrontational bluster and what could be the actual thinking of the North Korean regime.
Nobody believes, and there have been no provocative troop movements within North Korea, so nobody sees any steps on the ground that suggest North Korea is planning any kind of invasion, but certainly a resumption of missile testing would be quite dangerous. What the Bush administration is trying to do is to step this back slowly and diplomatically, but South Korea and Japan, perhaps, wish the United States would be more open, more forthcoming to at least saying that it will negotiate with North Korea, even if it takes a hard line in negotiations, because that seems to be the stumbling block right now. The Bush administration says it will listen to North Korea in any dialogue, but it has nothing to offer. The North Koreans say unless there's a two-way dialogue, they don't see a reason to sit down and talk with Washington.
O'BRIEN: Briefly, John, we're running out of time, but I have got to ask you quickly, walking the halls of the White House there, when you talk to people privately, do many people regret that term, axis of evil?
KING: No. They say the president was right. They say if you look at Iraq, if you look at North Korea, we don't talk much about Iran, but Iran has an active nuclear program as well, that the administration says is dangerous and is weapons-based. The Bush administration says this president will be criticized for it from time to time, especially by his critics, but that he calls it like he sees it and that he does not regret the term at all.
O'BRIEN: CNN's John King, our senior White House correspondent at the bureau today. Thank you very much, appreciate it.
KING: Thank you.
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