Hill to Pyongyang; Baek to Washington

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State and U.S. chief negotiator to the six-party talks Christopher Hill left for Pyongyang yesterday to check the disablement of North Korea’s nuclear facilities and discussions regarding its nuclear program. Meanwhile, Korea’s Chief Presidential Secretary for Security Affairs Baek Jong-cheon flew to Washington to discuss a permanent peace settlement on the Korean Peninsula yesterday.

Hill said upon arriving in Pyongyang, “If the challenges that we face are addressed, the U.S. position on North Korea will improve. The denuclearization process will bring progress to the diplomatic relationship between the U.S. and North Korea.” He is scheduled to stay in Pyongyang through December 5 in his second visit to North Korea following one on June 21-22.

Hill is pushing forward with a meeting with North Korean high-ranking military officials who hold the key to clarifying the country’s uranium enrichment program (UEP) before the deadline for the North’s declaration of its nuclear program. Pyongyang is currently reluctant to include its UEP on the list of nuclear programs to be declared, saying, “We can explain, but we cannot say we have something that we do not have.”

Whether Hill will meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is also drawing attention. A successful meeting between the two might lead to the acceleration of the denuclearization process.

Korea’s top security policy secretary Baek is planning to meet his U.S. counterpart Stephen Hadley, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, and other high-ranking officials in the Bush administration to discuss the U.S.-Korea alliance; the progress of denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula, and prospects for the six-party talks; and a declaration to end the Korean War and the establishment of a peace settlement on the peninsula.

Accompanying Baek is Presidential Aide for Security Strategy Park Seon-won, who provides the theoretical grounds for the need for a “political declaration” to end the war.

A government official said, “South Korea’s will to make a declaration to end the war as soon as possible was fully delivered to Kim Yang Gon, director of the United Front Department of the North Korea`s Workers` Party. You need to pay attention to the fact that Baek is visiting the U.S. immediately after Kim’s visit.”

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