State Department Noon Briefing

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DAILY PRESS BRIEFING

FRIDAY, MAY 4, 2001

1:15 P.M. (ON THE RECORD UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED)


Q:Could I ask you about Mr. Solana's statement today, but really more
directly what the US thinks the situation is so far as North Korea and
exports of missile technology? Are they under constraints; are they
self-imposed; and, of course, are they verifiable? He raised concerns
today.

MR. BOUCHER: I don't - I'm not quite sure what you are referring me
to. I'm not sure I have seen anything particular. There are some press
reports out of the visit of the European Union representatives to
North Korea, and these tend to indicate what Chairman Kim might have
said. The European Union will brief us in Washington next week on the
trip. As you know, we have been in touch with them all along,
discussed their interaction with North Korea with them on a number of
occasions, including the visit of the Swedish Foreign Minister to
Washington and other meetings that we have had.

So this is part of the whole process that we have supported and
encouraged of nations of the world working with North Korea as North
Korea emerges more into the world. And that general process has been
something that we have encouraged, and we have worked with others in
terms of doing that.

We have certainly noted the statements by Chairman Kim about a missile
moratorium. We have said before that maintaining the missile launch
moratorium is really essential for any future process in our dialogue.
If North Korea does maintain this moratorium, that would be
constructive.

I would point out at the same time we have supported the engagement
policy of the Republic of Korea, and we think the continued
North-South dialogue, including a second inter-Korean summit, would
also be a positive development.

As you do know, we have our interaction with Korea under review. That
review is ongoing. Frankly we don't think that review should affect
the pace of the inter-Korean dialogue, and we would look forward to
that second summit happening. We will conduct our review in a thorough
manner, and we will anticipate completing it in a timely fashion.

Q: That brings a couple of thoughts to mind. One is, are you depending
or hoping that South Korea could play the role that the US was also
playing when negotiations were alive to try to stop the North Koreans
from several things that are alarming, like missile development and
missile exports?

And secondly, I understood the review was under way while the ABM
question was grappled with, but it looks like there is no clear answer
yet what the US is going to do. So is this review pretty much a
suspension; and more than that, isn't it in effect an end to the
dialogue that the Clinton Administration, I think, successfully had
with North Korea?

MR. BOUCHER: Where did the ABM Treaty come in?

Q: I mean the missile defense review.

MR. BOUCHER: Okay. If I can put that in a coherent - let me try to
understand what you said and put together the answer.

This is a review. This is a review of policy, of how we should address
the issues of concern to us. The President, the Secretary of State and
others, have made quite clear that the nature of the regime, the
conventional forces, the missile exports, the missile developments --
all these events in North Korea - have been of serious concern to the
United States and remain of serious concern to the United States, and
that we need to figure out how best to deal with them.

That doesn't preclude a resumption of a dialogue at an appropriate
time, once we've completed our review and decided how we want to
proceed. It certainly doesn't preclude the involvement of others in
the process of North Korea's opening up which, as a general principle,
we have supported, and specifically in the case of South Korea we have
supported, because we believe that that engagement has been positive
and is positive.

Obviously they are going to want to address the issues on the
Peninsula. They have issues of reunification; they have issues of the
conventional forces, the threat on the Peninsula that they are going
to want to address. So one of the things that we have done, even while
our review is ongoing, is to maintain our engagement and our
discussion with the South Koreans and with the Japanese so that our
trilateral coordination, both individually, bilaterally between these
countries but also in a trilateral forum, has continued throughout.

So this is a real process under way that reviews policy, that supports
the general outlook that other countries have taken that compares
policy and hears from allies as we look specifically, but that looks,
in the end result, to figure out in a timely fashion how we can
address some of these chief issues of concern to us in this
relationship and to make sure that if we, at the appropriate time,
renew this dialogue that we address the issues in a manner that is
satisfactory to us. And that would involve things like verification,
things like raising the issues - other issues of importance to the
United States.

Q: Kim Dae Jung this week in a speech was concerned that the US was
actually flagging in its engagement with North Korea. What sorts of
things is the State Department saying to the South Koreans on this to
maybe assuage some of those concerns? And are there any kind of lower
level talks going on in New York right now with the North Koreans?

MR. BOUCHER: We have continued to have contacts with the North Koreans
through the New York channel on a variety of issues - not the big
issues of the relationship with the negotiations on missiles or
exports or anything like that. We have also continued to work very
closely with the South Koreans on issues involving North Korea and
have an ongoing relationship with them where we compare notes, what we
hear from them, what they hear from us. So I think our coordination
with South Korea, and Japan as well, is quite good on those issues.

Q: Can you get any more specific about the kinds of issues that are
not the big issues that you engage the North Koreans with? Terrorism?
Is that one?

MR. BOUCHER: I would have to go back and look at some of the things
that we have taken up in that channel. I think they are more sort of
logistical and sort of ongoing relationship issues, not major issues
of policy that need to be resolved, because we're looking at how we
want to resolve many of those in the course of the review.

Q: The moratorium on missile development by Kim Jong Il, how does this
affect your review, and does it make it more likely that you will
decide to resume the dialogue? And might it possibly accelerate the
pace of your review, which is taking a while?

MR. BOUCHER: I don't want to make any particular prediction at this
point. I think that it will be a thorough review that will conclude in
a timely fashion, and I'll stick to that.