(News Focus) Negotiators silent as nuclear talks reach sensitive stage

By Lee Chi-dong
SEOUL, Oct. 6 (Yonhap) -- South Korean nuclear negotiators have described the current situation on the North Korean nuclear issue as "very sensitive and unpredictable," even by the standards of often tumultuous negotiations marked by repeated stalemates and dramatic compromises.

Negotiators here were briefed by chief U.S. nuclear envoy Christopher Hill on the
outcome of his trip to North Korea last week aimed at coaxing Pyongyang into
signing a verification plan on its recent nuclear declaration. They have so far
stayed mum about it, as the U.S. has yet to give formal feedback to Pyongyang.
"We were ordered not to speak to media about related details, as the current
situation is so sensitive and difficult to predict," a senior Foreign Ministry
official said on the condition of anonymity. "Let's wait and see until the U.S.
or North Korea announces specifics."
The policy of "no comment" has kept local media and analysts guessing what Hill
has brought from his three-day visit to Pyongyang, where he met his counterpart
Kim Kye-gwan and Lt. Gen. Li Chan-bok, the North's chief military representative
to the inter-Korean border village of Panmunjom.
Media tried to get a hint from official remarks by Hill and South Korea's top
negotiator Kim Sook in Seoul and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's reported
resumption of public activity. Kim, said to have suffered a stroke in August,
watched a football match at Pyongyang university, the North's state-run news
agency said over the weekend in its first report in nearly two months on Kim's
outdoor activities.
The news of Kim's public appearance, released a day after the U.S. envoy's trip
there, may signal that he is preparing to make an important announcement on
Pyongyang's relations with Washington, speculated one editorial in the Dong-a
Ilbo, a major South Korean daily.
Hill also said earlier that he had "lengthy and substantial" discussions in the
North, indicating some progress.
"We had a lot of catching up to do and needless to say, there have been a lot of
problems in the six-party process. So indeed, we did quite a substantial review
of the activities in the last couple of months," Hill told reporters last Friday
after debriefing the South Korean nuclear negotiator. The U.S. shares information
on talks with North Korea with the other participants in the six-way talks --
South Korea, China, Russia, and Japan.
The South's envoy said that the foreign ministers of South Korea and the U.S.
and, if necessary, the presidents of the two sides will have to consult on the
substance of Hill's trip.
Some newspapers here reported that Hill appears to have fetched a counterproposal
regarding the verification plan or even broader issues, including a peace treaty
to formally end the 1950-53 Korean War and normalization of bilateral ties.
They also pointed out that the North has long insisted on simultaneous
inspections of nuclear weapons both in North Korea and South Korea, where 28,500
American troops are stationed.
"I think those media reports went too far," the ministry official said, adding
Hill's trip focused on reaching a compromise on a verification protocol. "I would
not place a big emphasis on the meeting between Assistant Secretary of State Hill
and the North Korean military figure."
The most pressing issue for the Bush administration is to resolve the stand-off
over the verification issue, he added.
The U.S. says a deal on ways of verifying the secretive nation's nuclear program,
based on soil sampling and access to key sites, is a precondition for the removal
of the North from the list of terrorism sponsoring nations under a 2007
aid-for-disarmament deal. Pyongyang argues that Washington's verification plan is
too strict.
Hill reportedly made a watered-down proposal during his trip to Pyongyang in a
last-ditch effort by the Bush administration to narrow the differences and save
the crumbling nuclear agreement.
The Yomiuri Shimbun said that the U.S. shifted to flexibility in both the
contents and format of the verification methods.
The Japanese newspaper said the U.S. was considering drawing a line between the
Yongbyon facilities and other undeclared sites as well as suspicions about
proliferation and the North's uranium enrichment program.
North Korea may also be allowed to give China the verification plan, it added,
paving the way for the U.S. to provisionally take North Korea off the terrorism
list, after which China would announce North Korea's acceptance of the
verification protocol.
A diplomatic source in Seoul said the overall U.S. stance towards North Korea has
softened somewhat following North Korea's measures to restart its
plutonium-producing plant in Yonbgyon.
Sung Kim, Washington's special envoy for the six-party talks on the North Korean
nuclear program who accompanied Hill's North Korea trip, is staying in South
Korea for a possible revisit there to discuss further details, the source added.
Analysts pointed out that the Bush administration in its final months will likely
focus its efforts on dealing with the verification issue rather than seeking any
deal beyond it.
"I doubt that the two sides discussed other issues at a time when the U.S. is in
the presidential election campaign period," Daniel Pinkston, Northeast Asia
project director at the International Crisis Group said. "With regard to the
possibility of a deal on the verification, it is really hard to expect."