[ASEM] EU states successively bare plans for rapprochement with N.K.

It seems that the Third Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) in Seoul has become an arena for European nations to announce their intentions to normalize diplomatic relations with North Korea. On the eve of the Seoul conference Thursday, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder made public their government¡¯s decisions to forge diplomatic ties with Pyongyang. On Friday, the foreign ministry of the Netherlands announced a similar plan to establish diplomatic relations with the North.

Of the 15 EU nations, only six -- Italy, Austria, Denmark, Finland, Portugal and Sweden -- have already set up diplomatic ties with the North. If Britain, Germany and the Netherlands join their ranks, nine nations, a majority of the EU states, will have normalized ties with the Pyongyang regime.

This trend is likely to accelerate with the adoption of the Seoul Declaration for Peace on the Korean Peninsula, which encourages the improvement of relations between the ASEM member countries and North Korea. The remaining nations, including France, Belgium, Spain, Greece, Ireland, and Luxembourg, are expected to follow suit and establish ties with the North sooner or later. Rapprochement will receive a further boost when the EU and the North hold a political dialogue slated for November or December.

In particular, France, as the chair of the EU, is likely to collect opinions from EU nations that do not have diplomatic ties with Pyongyang and come forward to opening dialogue with the North Korean leadership. In September, North Korean Foreign Minister Paek Nam-Sun delivered messages to nine European nations, including Britain, France and Germany, as well as the EU Executive Commission, expressing his government's intentions to establish diplomatic relations with them.