CONTENTS
1. DPRK Foreign Minister’s Australian Visit
2. ROK Commemoration of Korean War
3. US Policy toward DPRK
4. Taiwanese Missile Development
II. Republic of Korea 1. ROK Commemoration of Korean War
III. People’s Republic of China 1. PRC on DPRK-US Talks
2. DPRK Commemoration of Korean War
3. PRC-US Relations
4. US Nuclear Strategy
5. Russia-US Summit Meeting
6. Russian View of Shanghai Cooperative
7. Taiwan Missile Test
I. United States
1. DPRK Foreign Minister’s Australian Visit
Agence France Presse (“NORTH KOREAN FOREIGN MINISTER LEAVES FOR AUSTRALIA,” 6/26/01) reported that the DPRK’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said that DPRK Foreign Minister Paek Nam-sun left Tuesday for Australia. KCNA gave no details on Paek’s trip to Australia. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer invited Paek to visit Australia when they met in Pyongyang in November last year.
2. ROK Commemoration of Korean War
The Associated Press (Jae-Suk Yoo, “S. KOREA’S KIM URGES PEACE,” 6/26/01) reported that ROK President Kim Dae-jung said on June 25 at a luncheon marking the 51st anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War that his country and the DPRK should sign a peace treaty to formally end the conflict. Kim said, “This peace treaty, to be signed by the two Korean states, should be endorsed by the two major participants in the Korean War–the United States and China.” The DPRK’s official news agency, KCNA, reported on June 25 that thousands of citizens in the DPRK held an anti-US rally in Pyongyang. KCNA also reported that DPRK soldiers also held an anti-US speech contest on June 24 in Shinchon, 35 miles southwest of Pyongyang. The DPRK claims that US soldiers killed thousands of civilians in Shinchon during the war. KCNA said, “The participants in the contest denounced the U.S. imperialist aggressors for provoking the Korean War on June 25, 1950, and brutally murdering innocent people by the most barbarous methods.” [Ed. note: This article was included in the US Department of Defense’s Early Bird news service for June 26, 2001.]
3. US Policy toward DPRK
The Boston Globe published an opinion article by Leon V. Sigal, Director of the Northeast Cooperative Security Project at the Social Science Research Council in New York, (“MOVING FROM DENIAL TO ACCEPTANCE WITH NORTH KOREA,” 6/23/01) which said that the administration of US President George W. Bush is passing through a similar course in dealing with the DPRK as former Presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton. Sigal formulates five stages in which past administrations have dealt with the DPRK–denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. By resuming talks with the DPRK, Sigal notes that the Bush administration is now emerging from denial, but not yet bargaining in earnest. Instead, he wrote, “it has reneged on past US promises and introduced new demands that the North is bound to resist, slowing reconciliation with the South. That will lead Seoul to vent its displeasure, which is sure to anger the administration.” Sigal lists four main US interests at stake in dealing with the DPRK: preventing war on the Korean peninsula, stopping DPRK acquisition of nuclear arms, stops DPRK developing, testing, deploying and selling ballistic missiles, and promoting reconciliation between the two Koreas and peaceful reunification of the peninsula. The only way to achieve those aims, Sigal writes, is to test whether the DPRK is willing to cooperate with the US. However, he continues, “the idea that it doesn’t pay to negotiate with Pyongyang dies hard in Washington. So does the hope of getting something for nothing.” Sigal noted that the current Bush administration made a mistake not to continue where the Clinton administration ended and instead made greater demands without with reaffirming the US commitment to end enmity or concluding a missile deal. Sigal concluded, “When the Bush administration gets over its anger, the hope is that it will resume bargaining in good faith and accept the need to end enmity and begin cooperation with Pyongyang.”
4. Taiwanese Missile Development
Agence France Presse (“TAIWAN SECRETLY DEVELOPING CRUISE MISSILE,” Taipei, 6/26/01) reported that Tuesday’s Taiwanese United Daily News said that Taiwan is secretly developing a cruise missile that could be used to strike most of the PRC’s military establishments. The report said the missile has demonstrated a range of hundreds of kilometers in flight tests, and the researchers hope to develop a weapon with a range up to 1,000 kilometers (620 miles). The paper said last week that authorities were also developing a surface-to-surface missile with a range of up to 2,000 kilometers. The military-run Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology denied the report. The paper said that the cruise missile, developed under the “Hsiungfeng II E project,” was virtually a copy of the US Tomahawk missile. The paper said that should a war break out, the missile could be used to attack PRC missile bases, military commands, ammunition depots, naval bases and power plants in the Shenyang, Beijing, Jinan, Nanjin and Guangdong military districts. It said that the two development projects mark a deviation of Taiwan’s military strategy, which has focused its efforts on defense against the PRC rather than on offense.
II. Republic of Korea
1. ROK Commemoration of Korean War
Joongang Ilbo (Kim Hee-sung, “PRESIDENT KIM, ‘NLL SHALL BE WELL GUARDED’,” Seoul, 06/25/01) reported that ROK President Kim Dae-jung said on Monday that the Northern Limit Line (NLL) and ROK territorial waters would be well protected. “We will continue to guard our land until the day of permanent peace and continue to retain close ties with our allies and the UN,” President Kim said during the special ceremony held in Shilla Hotel to give recognition to war veterans on the 51st anniversary of the Korean War. “A North-South peace treaty is a must in order to bring an end to truce situation in the Korean Peninsula,” the President continued. “And in order to realize this treaty we need the U.S. and China’s supports, the two powers that were involved back in the Korean War and cooperate on its implementation as well as backing from the UN nations.” “However it should be the North and South that should play the leading role,” the President underlined. He continued that the whole world supports the ROK’s engagement policy including the US, Japan, the PRC, Russia, European Union nations and more. “Our engaging Sunshine policy is, after all, designed to realize peaceful coexistence of the two Koreas and eventually materialize peaceful reunification through various exchanges…. Last year’s Joint Declaration adopted during the first inter-Korean summit was based on this spirit. This progress toward peace is what our servicemen and UN allies of the war times have left for us.”
III. People’s Republic of China
China Daily (Meng Yan, “HOPES HIGH FOR DPRK TALKS,” 06/20/01, P2) reported that PRC Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue said during a routine press briefing on June 19 that China hopes a resumption of dialogue between the US and DPRK will promote reconciliation on the Korean Peninsula. “Reconciliation on the Korean Peninsula serves the interests of all parties,” she said. A breakdown in relations between the US and DPRK earlier this year has obstructed the reconciliation process on the peninsula, she explained. “We hope to see the US and DPRK resume talks over issues of mutual concern and make efforts to improve the situation on the peninsula,” Zhang said.
2. DPRK Commemoration of Korean War
People Daily (Xinhua News Agency, Zhang Jinfang and Li Zhengyu, “PYONG HOLDS BIG-SCALE ANTI-US MASS RALLY,” Pyongyang, 06/26/01, P3) reported that in Pyongyang on June 24, 200,000 people assembled at Kim Il-Sung Square to memorize the 51st anniversary of “June 25 Anti-US Day.” The chairman of the Pyongyang People’s Committee delivered a speech at the rally. He said, since the armistice, the DPRK Party and Government has tried its utmost to end the instable situation on the Korean Peninsula, eliminate the danger of war, realize lasting peace and achieve peaceful reunification. However, he said the US did not draw lessons from the failed Korean War, but adopts hostile attitudes towards the DPRK. The hostile DPRK policies of the new US Government have impeded the reconciliation process on the peninsula, he added. He stressed that the DPRK will fight resolutely to balance the US hostile DPRK policies.
3. PRC-US Relations
Global Times (Wang Jisi, “COLD WAR CAN BE AVOIDED BETWEEN PRC AND US,” 06/22/01, P7) carried an article on PRC-US relations in the new century. Since the end of the Cold War, Wang said, the US has adopted a dual China policy. On the one hand, the US tries to contain China by pressuring it eternally. On the other hand, the US wishes to facilitate the internal change of China that accords with US expectations by means of engagement. The new US President stressed more on the hard side, which is absolutely not accidental. The article enumerates the domestic and international reasons for the new US administration’s harder attitudes toward China. Domestically, with the win of the Republican Bush, he needs to placate the right-wing conservative force. Politically, the right-wingers advocate an increased defense budget, development of a missile shield, and implementation of unilateralism to safeguard national security. The influence of the right-wing Christians’ anti-foreignism is increasing in the US; thus criticizing the PRC tends to be a tool used by the politicians for their political interest. Put in the international arena, the US still leads the world in spite of its economic slowdown. Besides, “countries of concern” like Iraq, Iran and DPRK either are in trouble themselves or show new signals to the US. The recovery of Russia needs time, and European countries and Japan are not willing to confront the US openly though they are not satisfied with the US. The rising socialist China, advocating multi-polarity and criticizing US hegemony, thus stands as the US’s big obstacle. The third reason lies in China itself. The US dreams of China’s domestic change, including economic reform and the coming to power of a pro-western younger generation, were broken one by one. The US observers saw the young generation’s patriotic enthusiasm after the bombing of Chinese Embassy and the shifting attitude of the mainland toward Taiwan. All these factors made the US side begin to realize the sophistication and protracted nature of bilateral relations. The article pointed out that all these above-mentioned facts reveal that the US harder position to China has some inevitability. However, it argued, this can not lead to the conclusion that the Bush Government takes China as its enemy and China and the US will definitely confront with each other. Wang elaborated his points by analyzing US domestic politics, international patterns and China itself. In terms of US domestic politics, there is one law of it, which is that the advantage of ideology and power between the Democrats and the Republicans will not last long on either side. Even in the military, they are not all hard-liners. Concerning the international patterns, the US is not only aggressive toward China, but also imperious to other countries, which inevitably runs it into snags everywhere. The article argued that China does not constitute a threat to the US in terms of its comprehensive power, strategic intension and international influence. Besides, there exist lots of common interests between the PRC and the US. The deteriorated bilateral relations may, in the short term, accord with the minority conservative force and military industrial groups, but are against the long-term and fundamental interests of the US. Due to the extensive economic trade and social communications between the two countries, Wang suggested, some partial contradictions and conflicts should be settled through diplomatic ways in order to avoid a new Cold War. Those deep-level and structural contradictions should be faced seriously. China and US need dialogue and cooperation in all aspects and all fields, which can help to eliminate confrontational factors.
4. US Nuclear Strategy
People Daily (Xinhua News Agency, Tang Shuifu, “US STRESSES MAD STRATEGY,” Washington, 06/22/01, P3) reported that on June 20, US Secretary of State Colin Powell said at the Senate Foreign Committee that even if the US has developed a missile defense system, the “mutual assured destruction” (MAD) strategy, the basis for nuclear deterrence during the Cold War, is still absolutely necessary. He said that the MAD strategy means that a country owns enough weapons to prevent other countries from launching attacks. This strategy applies to the US missile defense program, he added. However, some US military experts said the MAD strategy is immoral, for could cost millions of civilians’ lives.
5. Russia-US Summit Meeting
Jiefang Daily (Xinhua News Agency, “PUTIN: CONFIDENCE WAS BUILT IN RUSSIA-US SUMMIT MEETING,” Moscow, 06/21/01, P4) and People Daily (Ma Jian, “RUSSIA OPPOSES US NMD PROGRAM,” Moscow, 06/21/01, P3) reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin said on June 19 that the major outcome of his meeting with US President George W. Bush is that the two countries began to build confidence. When interviewed by a US journalist at the Kremlin, Putin said that Russia wished to reach positive achievements in the summit and it did realized its expected goals in many aspects. Responding to the question whether their positions on the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty are closer, Putin said that this issue is still under discussion. Besides, he added, the ABM treaty regime itself needs to be improved. He reiterated Russia’s proposal to keep the 1972 ABM treaty, stressing that it is this treaty that maintains the current international security system. The end of ABM treaty would mean the abolition of START-I and START- II, he warned, leading Russia to re-deploy multi-warheaded ICBMs. “I cannot agree with the US to name those so- called unfriendly countries as rogue states,” he added.
6. Russian View of Shanghai Cooperative
People Daily (Xinhua News Agency, Sun Zhanlin, “SCO IS IMPORTANT FOR ASIA-PACIFIC STABILITY,” Moscos, 06/20/01, P3) reported that in a interview by a Russian TV Station on June 18, Russian Foreign Minister Ivanov said that the Shanghai Cooperative Organization (SCO) will play a stabilizing role in the Asia-Pacific region. He said that Russia’s political role and geographical position determine its global foreign policies. Russia will be neither pro-Western nor pro-Eastern, he stressed, because it has interests in all these regions. Russia will carry out foreign policies that are consistent with its national interests.
7. Taiwan Missile Test
China Daily (Guo Nei, “TAIWAN MISSILE TESTS INCREASE TENSIONS,” 06/21/01, P1) reported that PRC experts and military analysts warned that Taiwan’s testing of US-made Patriot missiles on June 20 will only sharpen tense relations across the Taiwan Straits. Purchases and deployments of advanced weapons by the authorities in Taiwan threaten to jeopardize reunification of China, experts said. Yu Keli, deputy Director of the Institute of Taiwan Studies under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, was quoted as saying that the Taiwan authorities’ recent purchase of advanced weapons for potential use against the PRC has revealed that they oppose the reunification of China. He warned that Taiwan should realize that test-firing missiles will only put the island in a more precarious position. According to Luo Yuan, research fellow with the Department of Strategy Studies under the Academy of Military Sciences of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), it is absurd for the Taiwan authorities to provoke the mainland with its small arsenal of advanced weapons.
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