Delegations to the Six-Party Talks (China, Japan, North and South Korea, Russia and the US) met in Beijing on 8–10 December to try to record the verification procedures in writing, but discussions quickly reached a stalemate. South Korea's Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan probably had it right when he earlier assessed that North Korea's refusal on the sampling issue was a typical ploy to provoke a small crisis in hopes of receiving compensation for then resolving it. Pyongyang may be waiting for the Obama administration.
Other aspects of the February 2007 agreement also remain in dispute. Although eight of the 11 agreed steps to disable the plutonium programme were completed when the crisis erupted in mid August, the remaining steps are the most crucial. These include:
-
removal of all 8,000 plutonium-bearing spent fuel rods from the reactor (about 5,000 have been removed, but the work is going slowly);
-
cutting of the control-rod drive mechanism (so no more fuel can be loaded); and
-
disablement of fresh fuel rods (the parties are at odds on how to do this).
In any case, the disablement is only temporary. The actions taken to disable the reprocessing facility, for example, could be reversed in a couple of months, although degradation caused by lack of maintenance will make this more difficult over time. Meanwhile, North Korea complains that only half of the promised energy aid has been delivered. Russia delayed its scheduled oil shipment in September because of Pyongyang's backtracking on disablement. South Korea similarly delayed a shipment of steel pipes under the agreement.
Assessing the internal dynamics of North Korea is never easy. Analysing Pyongyang's moves during the past four months, some experts see its actions as prompted by a conservative backlash against tentative economic reforms. Others see the entrenchment as part of a longer pattern of wariness, brinkmanship and bargaining intended to derive maximum leverage from the weapons programmes.
One certain conclusion is that North Korea will not be parting with its nuclear weapons any time soon.
