Nuclear talks crumble, protracted stalemate looms

(ATTN: UPDATES throughout with S. Korean envoy's comments)
By Lee Chi-dong
BEIJING, Dec. 11 (Yonhap) -- Delegates to the six-party talks on denuclearizing North Korea failed Thursday to produce a deal on ways to inspect the North's nuclear facilities, casting clouds over the future of the often-troubled multilateral talks.
"After all, North Korea said it could not consent to putting verification methods
in writing at this moment," South Korean negotiator Kim Sook told reporters after
four days of talks that also involved the United States, China, Russia and Japan.
This week's talks, the first session in five months, aimed to produce a package
agreement on ways to check the accuracy of the nuclear inventory that the North
submitted in June and set a new deadline for completing the disabling of its
Yongbyon reactor and the delivery of heavy oil from the other parties.
As negotiators failed to make headway on the verification issue, they gave up
trying to fix the timeline.
Chief American envoy Christopher Hill expressed disappointment.
"Ultimately, the DPRK (North Korea) was not ready, really, to reach a verification
protocol with all the standards that are required," he said at the Beijing
international airport as he headed back to Washington.
He was apparently referring to Pyongyang's refusal to let international
inspectors to take samples from soil and wastes at its nuclear facilities. The
U.S. has emphasized that sampling is a crucial verification tool.
Hill said the related nations will keep working on the issue but said no schedule
was set for the next round.
China released a two-page chairman's statement to summarize the outcome of the
talks which were originally scheduled to finish on Wednesday but extended by
another day.
It said the related nations will continue efforts to wrap up the drawn-out second
phase of the three-tier denuclearisation process agreed last year.
"The Parties agreed, as described in the October 3 Second Phase Agreement, to
implement in parallel the disablement of the Yongbyon nuclear facilities and the
provision of economic energy assistance equivalent to one million tons of heavy
fuel oil," the statement read. About 550,000 tons have been delivered so far in
return for the slow-going disabling.
South Korea, which chairs energy aid working group, hinted at slowing the economic
assistance after the six-way talks collapsed.
"The issue of suspending the economic and energy aid is a very sensitive issue,"
Seoul's envoy Kim said. "I can't say now only in a negative perspective. I can't
say either we will continue energy aid, given the verification issue. It is a
matter to be decided through comprehensive reviews of related conditions."
When asked about the future of the six-way talks, he said "it is like riding a
bicycle."
"It is hard to predict how it will proceed if efforts are not made to move forward
and momentum is not maintained," he said.
lcd@yna.co.kr
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