#10 - RW 269
Asia Times
August 14, 2003
The two Koreas' pre-talks Moscow talks
By Sergei Blagov

MOSCOW - Russian officials greeted North and South Korean envoys in the Russian capital on the eve of the upcoming six-nation talks in Beijing on the North Korea nuclear crisis. However, no concrete agreements were discussed, let alone reached.

President Vladimir Putin's special envoy on North Korea, Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov, held talks on Wednesday with North Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Kung Sok-ung, while on the same day Deputy Foreign Minister Valery Loschinin met with his South Korean counterpart, Kim Je-sop. There were no meetings between North and South Korean envoys or trilateral meetings with Russian diplomats acting as mediators, according to official Russian statements.

"Russia welcomes the North Korean decision to take part in six-side talks" and hopes that a constructive solution of the problem will be found "on the basis of nuclear-free status of the Korean Peninsula", the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement after the meetings.

However, actual results of the meetings in Moscow proved to be modest. "No agreements were discussed," the Russian Information Agency (RIA) quoted anonymous diplomatic sources in Moscow on Wednesday. "These were merely consultations," the sources stated.

It is understood that Moscow was trying to advise Pyongyang against hardline statements, but without any apparent success. North Korea demanded that an effective non-aggression treaty should be signed with the United States and that Washington should give up what is viewed in Pyongyang as its "hostile policy" toward North Korea, the North Korean Foreign Ministry reportedly announced on Wednesday.

After yet another spate of Pyongyang's trademark rhetoric, the South Korean envoy in Moscow could hardly sound optimistic. North Korea's demand of signing a non-aggression treaty with the United States will not affect the plans of holding six-side talks on the North Korean problems, South Korean First Deputy Foreign Minister Kim Je-sop announced in Moscow on Wednesday.

North Korea's ambassador to Moscow was among the first to indicate Pyongyang's willingness to accept six-sided talks. Ambassador Pak Ui-chun made the announcement at a meeting with Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov on July 31. "Russia has expressed satisfaction over Pyongyang's constructive decision," according to the Foreign Ministry statement.

China confirmed on Thursday that it will host the six-way talks on August 27-29 in Beijing.

Meanwhile, Putin's special representative to the Far Eastern Federal District, Konstantin Pulikovsky, is due to visit North Korea this month to discuss bilateral cooperation, but not to negotiate the nuclear issue.

Retired General Pulikovsky has been seen as Russia's leading expert on North Korea and its leader, Kim Jong-il. Pulikovsky accompanied the reclusive Dear Leader on his train rides to Russia. Moreover, Pulikovsky wrote a book revealing details of the trips. Among other things, Pulikovsky claimed that "Kim Jong-il radiated strong personal energy".

On Wednesday, Pulikovsky also announced that Russia is due to hold major naval exercises August 18-29. US, Japanese, North Korean and South Korean observers are due to attend, Pulikovsky was quoted as saying by the RIA news agency.

Meanwhile, Russian media speculated over possible military involvement in Korea. "Russia's best response to a possible nuclear conflict on the Korean Peninsula would be a preemptive missile strike against North Korean nuclear facilities, carried out by the Russian Pacific Fleet," the country's leading daily Izvestia wrote. The daily quoted anonymous Pacific Fleet sources as saying that Russia's Varyag cruiser would be able to use its cruise missiles and destroy North Korean launch facilities.

In the event of a nuclear explosion on the Korean Peninsula, there would be a 70 percent chance that a radioactive cloud would reach Russia's Primorie region within two to three hours, Izvestia quoted the head of Primorie meteorological service, Boris Kubai. So far, Russian officials have refrained from comments on Izvestia's allegations.

Apart from media gloom-mongers, Russian officials came up with warnings as well. A "deteriorating situation on the Korean Peninsula would jeopardize regional security", Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov stated on July 30.

Last month, the official RIA newswire claimed that North Korea was about to declare itself a nuclear power, tentatively on September 9, a national holiday marking the anniversary of the founding of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in 1948. So far, this report is yet to be confirmed by Pyongyang.

On the other hand, the Kremlin has repeatedly offered mediation in the Korea standoff. Russia is ready to host "any meetings and talks, to help in any form so as to normalize the situation" around North Korea, Putin stated on June 22. "It is a very sensitive issue for Russia due to the proximity to the Russian border," he said.

However, the Russia leader argued that Pyongyang was unlikely to draft any aggressive plans. "North Korea is now in such a state that I do not have any reasons to believe that this country has any aggressive intentions."

Putin has also urged the Pyongyang be provided with guarantees of "non-aggression". He also said that all interested parties, including South Korea, Japan, China, the US and Russia, should take part in solving the controversy over Pyongyang's nuclear program.

It has been reported that last May Kim Jong-il sent a letter to Putin seeking his help in breaking the stalemate in the talks with the United States over the nuclear crisis.

Russia was sidelined when North Korea, the United States and China held talks on the nuclear crisis in Beijing last April. Russia's absence from the April talks has been explained as a consequence of Moscow's unsuccessful mediation attempts last January. Now Russia presumably hopes that the upcoming six-side talks could re-establish its clout on the Korean Peninsula.

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