In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

III. Japan

I. United States

1a. Hwang Defection: Hwang’s Statements [Ed. Note: please see the Special Reports issued earlier to day for excerpts from various Hwang letters.]

Reuters (“N.KOREA DEFECTOR THREATENS TO DIE IN BEIJING,” Rome, 2/14/97) reported a statement from the ROK embassy in Rome (but datelined Seoul) that Hwang Jang-yop, the DPRK official seeking asylum in the ROK, has said he will die in Beijing if his request is not granted. The statement quoted him as saying, “I want to make it clear that South Korea is the place where I want to go, and I will not go to any third country.” The embassy report also said Seoul’s foreign ministry had issued a statement Thursday hand-written by Hwang. It quoted Hwang’s note as saying, “My remaining life will not be long. I am a failed man in politics.” It also quotes the note as saying, “I don’t have a slightest intention to take a share in any one side. I only wish to give help to south-north relations and unification until the last minute of my life.”

1b. Hwang Defection: Embassy Events

The New York Times (Patrick E. Tyler, “DEFECTOR FROM KOREA IS HOT POTATO FOR BEIJING,” Beijing, 2/14/97) reported that Hwang’s case is extraordinary not only because of his rank, but also as a result of the defection drama playing itself out in front of the ROK embassy in Beijing.

The Los Angeles Times (Rone Tempest, “CHINA GRAPPLES WITH DEFECTION DILEMMA,” Beijing, 2/14/97) quoted ROK embassy spokesman Chang Mo

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

I. United States

1a. Hwang Defection: Current Diplomacy

The Associated Press (Renee Schoof, “KOREAS MANEUVER OVER DEFECTOR,” Beijing, 2/13/97) reported that the PRC, the DPRK and the ROK were involved in frantic diplomatic maneuvering Thursday in the wake of the apparent defection of Hwang Jang-yop, the 72-year-old high-ranking DPRK official and party ideologue who on Wednesday sought asylum in the ROK embassy in Beijing. Defecting with Hwang was Kim Duk-hong, 59, identified as the president of a DPRK trading firm in Beijing. The ROK pressed the PRC to allow the ROK to bring Hwang immediately to Seoul, and enable ROK officials to learn all Hwang knows about the DPRK’s secretive government. The DPRK continues to insist Hwang has been kidnapped, and DPRK nationals have made attempts to get past PRC police guarding the ROK embassy to reach him [Ed. note: see item below]. The DPRK urged the PRC to take “appropriate measures” and threatened unspecified retaliation if Hwang had been kidnapped. The ROK responded by putting its entire 650,000-member military on higher alert. The PRC Foreign Ministry issued a brief statement calling for calm. PRC media did not cover the story other than to report the statement. PRC officials appeared to be seeking a way to navigate through the situation without offending either the DPRK, a long-time ally, or the ROK, an important new trading partner. Ultimately, however, the PRC government will have to decide whether Hwang will go to Pyongyang or Seoul.

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. People’s Republic of China

I. United States

1. DPRK Official Apparently Defects

Reuters (“N. KOREA’S TOP IDEOLOGUE DEFECTS TO S. KOREA,” Seoul, 2/12/97) reported that the ROK Foreign Ministry announced Wednesday that Hwang Jang-yop, a close aide to DPRK leader Kim Jong-il, defected and sought asylum at Seoul’s embassy in Beijing along with his assistant Kim Dok-hong. “Workers Party secretary Hwang Jang-yop expressed his intention to defect at 10:05 a.m. (local time) at the consular section of the embassy,” Ryu Kwang-sok, director-general of the Foreign Ministry’s Asia-Pacific Bureau, told reporters. “Our embassy in China has notified Hwang’s defection to the Chinese authorities [sic] and we are trying to resolve the matter through diplomatic channels,” Ryu said. However, the DPRK Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) quickly denied the report, issuing a foreign ministry statement saying the defection was “inconceivable and impossible” and that the ROK’s claim was a ruse to cover the kidnapping of the official. Hwang, 73, played a leading role in shaping the policy of Juche, which provides the ideological underpinning for communism in the DPRK, and is one of eleven secretaries on the powerful secretariat of the ruling Workers Party. He is also a member of the party’s central committee and is in charge of its foreign policy, according to Seoul officials who rank him number 24 in the Pyongyang power structure. The report of the defection comes four days before Kim Jong-il’s much heralded 55th birthday. The ROK minist

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

I. United States

1. Food Aid to DPRK

US State Department Spokesman Nicholas Burns (“STATE DEPARTMENT NOON BRIEFING, FEB. 10,” USIA Transcript, 2/11/97) condemned the editorial article by Andrew Natsios in the February 9 edition of The Washington Post, and the accompanying staff editorial, which criticized the inadequacy and politicization of the US response to the DPRK food crisis. [Ed. note: For a summary of the Natsios editorial, see “Food Aid to DPRK” in the February 10 Daily Report.] Burns said: “This was very puzzling to me — very puzzling, indeed. Because we said several times last week, publicly … that the United States had met previous food appeals from the World Food Program; that we did treat as an urgent matter the humanitarian situation of the people of North Korea.” Burns added that the US is expecting another appeal from the UN World Food Program this week, and that the US “will very seriously study its analysis of the food situation in North Korea. We will make our decision to provide food assistance to North Korea based solely on humanitarian considerations.” Burns said that “as always” the US is consulting with the ROK, adding that, “We are doing what we must to fashion a good, consistent policy on the Korean peninsula for peace.” Burns concluded: “It’s very puzzling to see this strong editorial criticism from a major national newspaper when it is completely undeserved. We’ve been paying attention to the situation. We’ve been talking to the United Nation

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

III. Japan

I. United States

1. DPRK Nuclear Plant Construction Talks

The Dow Jones News Services (“S. KOREA, JAPAN, U.S. TO MEET FOR N. KOREA NUCLEAR TALKS,” Seoul, 2/10/97) reported that the ROK Foreign Ministry said Monday that officials from Seoul, Tokyo and Washington will meet later this week for talks on providing new nuclear reactors to the DPRK. The two-day working meeting will be held in Tokyo on Wednesday and Thursday, and will include discussion on various issues, including membership of the European Union in the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO), the international consortium set up to build two light-water reactors in the DPRK. The meeting also will discuss the dispatching of a survey team expected later this month, ministry officials said. Stephen Bosworth, KEDO Director, has said construction on the reactors would begin in April.

2. Four-Party Talks Briefing and DPRK Food Aid

The AP-Dow Jones News Service (Steve Glain, “N. KOREA BOYCOTT PLOY FOR MORE AID – S. KOREA OFFICIAL,” Seoul, 2/10/97) reported that ROK National Security Adviser Ban Ki Moon said in an interview that the DPRK’s decision to boycott the US/ROK joint briefing on the four-party peace talks proposal is a ploy to win new concessions in the form of food aid. DPRK officials last week that they would not participate in the briefing, a preliminary step toward formal talks, until negotiations with a US company for a large shipment of grain were concluded

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

III. Russian Federation

I. United States

1. US-DPRK Relations: Food Aid, Briefing

DPRK Ambassador to United Nations Kim Hyong-u, in an interview with CNN world affairs correspondent Ralph Begleiter (WorldView, “NORTH KOREAN TALKS ABOUT HIS COUNTRY’S FOOD CRISIS,” 2/4/97), replied to a question concerning the DPRK’s postponement of attendance of the scheduled US/ROK briefing on the four-party peace talks proposal. Kim said: “On our side, the delegation to participate in the briefing has been composed. But what we have agreed upon is that we shall be participating in the briefing on the understanding that, on condition that both sides undertake simultaneous actions. However, the United States has not moved in the direction of providing us with food which it has promised in previous meetings with the United States and my country have had. Therefore, the problem, the matter of when the participation from our sides in the briefing will take place depends solely on whether the United States has implementing its promise that it has made to us or not. I think that reason behind the non-implementation of the promise on the part of the United States is because that the United States has been affected by the ill-minded forces that do not want the improvement of the relations between my country and the United States.” Kim also said that claims that the DPRK is diverting resources from its people to support a massive military “are totally incorrect,” and added that no DPRK military personnel are assigned to the delegation chosen to attend the briefing. Kim also discussed recent reports concerning the depth of the food aid the DPRK n

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

III. People’s Republic of China.

I. United States

1. Four-Party Peace Talks Briefing Postponement

US State Department Spokesman Nicholas Burns (“STATE DEPARTMENT NOON BRIEFING, FEB. 4,” USIA Transcript, 2/5/97) replied to a question referring to a February 4 Washington Post article that quoted an unnamed US official as saying that the DPRK is insisting that, before it will attend peace talks, the US must underwrite its grain purchase from Cargill Inc. (which is currently being negotiated). Burns said: “Well, I think the North Koreans are looking for a more active role by the United States Government in these negotiations. Frankly, we’re not going to get involved. We don’t get involved in commercial transactions.” [Ed. note: For a summary of the Washington Post article, please see “Four-Party Peace Talks Briefing Postponement” in the US section of the February 4 Daily Report.]

Earlier in the briefing, Burns also commented on the postponement of the joint US/ROK briefing of the DPRK on the four-party peace talks proposal. Burns said: “We’d like to see the North Koreans. We had two meetings scheduled. Now both of those meetings have been postponed. The North Koreans have very important grain negotiations underway, and they prefer to consummate those negotiations before they get on to the meetings with us and the South Koreans in New York. So we’re not going to give out any dates for future meetings until we know that the North Koreans actually intend to attend the meetings. We’ll continue talking to them

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

I. United States

1. Four-Party Peace Talks Briefing Postponement

US State Department Spokesman Nicholas Burns (“STATE DEPARTMENT NOON BRIEFING, FEB. 3,” USIA Transcript, 2/4/97) confirmed that the joint US/ROK briefing on the four-party peace talks proposal will not take place as scheduled on February 5 in New York, because the DPRK wants first to complete a grain purchase deal with a private US company. Burns said: “The North Koreans have told us once again that they need to give, as they say, first priority to their business discussions with Cargill and others for the procurement of grain. So therefore it is uncertain when this joint briefing will be rescheduled. I think having postponed it once and set a date, I don’t think we’re in a position where we want to set a date again. The North Koreans believe they need to go through their grain discussions. We hope that when those grain discussions are concluded or perhaps even before that they might decide to have this briefing.” Burns said he did not know if the DPRK asked the US to underwrite the grain deal, but added that the US “believes that these are private grain discussions” in which the only US involvement is to issue the export license. Burns also said that if the UN World Food Program issues an emergency appeal for food aid to the DPRK, the US “will treat that as a very serious issue. As you know, the United States has responded to these appeals in the past.”

The Washington Post (Kevin Sullivan, “PLEA FOLLOWS E

In today’s Report:

I. United States

II. Republic of Korea

III. Announcements

I. United States

1. DPRK Food Crisis

Reuters (“N.KOREA SAYS GRAIN STOCKS FALL SHORT,” Tokyo, 2/3/97) and the Associated Press (“NORTH KOREA APPEALS FOR AID,” Seoul, 2/3/97) reported that the DPRK’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Monday it had only half the grain needed to feed its people, and appealed for international food donations. “As is known to all, North Korea has in recent years been repeatedly hit by unprecedented natural disasters, which greatly damaged agriculture and other sectors of the national economy and caused temporary food problems,” KCNA said. “The nation’s annual demand for grain is about 7.84 million tons, of which 4.82 million tons is needed as food,” it said, adding that last year’s flood-damaged grain output was only 2.5 million tons, “the amount being far less than expected.” The shortfall of 2.3 million tons is the same amount estimated by the UN World Food Program, which is preparing to issue another appeal — the third since last year — for large-scale food aid to the DPRK. The KCNA plea followed a statement last week by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies that food rations in the DPRK had dropped to a level four times lower than normally considered essential for a healthy population. The KCNA report thanked the international community, including the US, for past food assistance. “We are really grateful for this,” KCNA said. However, the announcement, an unusually frank and detailed description of