By Lt. General Robert Gard
The U.S. needs to rethink its current position on reopening negotiations with Pyongyang.
North Korea’s nuclear weapons program marches on. According to several reports, Pyongyang recently re-started its reactor to produce spent fuel from which weapons grade plutonium is reprocessed, upgraded its uranium enrichment facility, dug additional tunnels in its nuclear test site and expanded its missile launch facilities.
The United States has been urging China to bring its North Korean ally under control. At the end of October of this year, China’s Special Representative for Korean Peninsula Affairs met in Washington, D.C. over a two-day period with U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman. The Chinese official confirmed North Korea’s willingness to resume negotiations without preconditions with the U.S. on its nuclear program, and urged it to accept promptly.
What was the response of the U.S. government? North Korea must offer “concrete proof” of its commitment to “irreversible” nuclear disarmament before it will agree to a resumption of negotiations. In other words, Pyongyang must concede to the final outcome the U.S. seeks as a precondition to its willingness even to enter negotiations with North Korea on its goals of easing sanctions and signing a peace treaty to replace the armistice that ended the Korean War.
Read the full story at The Diplomat