N. Korea fifth-greatest danger to U.S.: Pew survey

By Hwang Doo-hyong
WASHINGTON, Oct. 5 (Yonhap) -- Americans feel less threatened by North Korea than
they did a year before, a U.S. public survey showed Sunday, amid last-minute
talks to secure the communist state's denuclearization.

Only six percent of the 2,982 Americans surveyed by the Pew Research Center in
early September said North Korea represented the greatest danger to the U.S., a
sharp decline from last year's 17 percent, according to the center's Web site.
North Korea represented the fifth-greatest danger to the U.S., according to
respondents, following Iran (21 percent), China (16 percent), Russia (14 percent)
and Iraq (13 percent).
In a Pew survey conducted in February last year, Americans considered the North
the third-greatest threat. That figure was likely influenced by North Korea's
detonation of its first nuclear device months earlier.
North Korea recently presented its nuclear declaration to the U.S. and blasted
its nuclear cooling tower, signaling a major breakthrough for the six-party
nuclear talks, which have progressed sluggishly over the past five years.
But the talks hit another snag as North Korea began restarting its nuclear
facilities disabled under a multilateral aid-for-denuclearization deal, citing
the U.S.'s failure to remove the North from its terrorism blacklist.
U.S. chief nuclear negotiator Christopher Hill visited Pyongyang last week in an
attempt to break the deadlock over a verification protocol on the North's nuclear
facilities.
The survey also showed that Americans saw Iran (21 percent) as posing the
greatest threat for the third consecutive year in 2008. The comparable figures
for Iran were 25 percent in 2007 and 27 percent in 2006.
The figure for China has been relatively steady with 16 percent this year, 14
percent in 2007, 20 percent in 2006 and 16 percent in 2005.
The figure for Russia rose sharply to 14 percent this year from last year's 2
percent, apparently due to the war in Georgia.
"While an increasing percentage views Russia as the greatest national danger to
the United States, fewer than half (44 percent) believe that growing tensions
between Russia and its neighbors represents a major threat to U.S. well-being,"
the Web site said.
About 18 percent said they viewed Russia as an adversary while 48 percent said
Russia represents a serious problem but is not an adversary.
Meanwhile, 72 percent responded that Islamic groups like al Qaeda represent a
major threat to the U.S.