Explore Asia. Asia October 8, Dispatches. Kanae Doi Japan Director. Asia September 2, Dispatches. Refugees and Migrants July 22, Dispatches. Videos Watch more. Reports More reports. October 19, Report. November 1, Report. April 11, Report. August 2, Report. October 10, Letter. Kim Il Sung died in at the age of 82, not long after concluding the Agreed Framework with the Clinton administration.
His son, Kim Jong Il, who had been groomed for the job by President Kim, took over the leadership of the country. In October , a senior US State Department official representing the Bush administration presented DPRK representatives in Pyongyang with charges that their government had a clandestine uranium enrichment programme.
Thus began the second North Korean nuclear crisis. Since October , Kim Jong Il has steadily ratcheted up the level of the crisis through one provocative action after another.
Morrison In the meantime, North Korea has withdrawn from the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, which it has also violated, and evicted inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency who were overseeing the implementation of the Agreed Framework.
North Korea has taken steps to restart its closed 5-megawatt electric nuclear reactor and some activity has been seen at its reprocessing plant, where plutonium could be extracted from some fuel rods stored in a nearby cooling pond. Estimates are that North Korea would have enough plutonium in hand within a few months from this source to fabricate six to eight nuclear weapons, and could do so, probably by the end of the year at the latest.
Flight tests of short-range, anti-ship missiles have been conducted as Pyongyang escalates its provocative activities almost weekly and the possibility of renewing tests of long-range missiles is very real.
A geniune crisis has emerged, regardless of how the U. How did matters come to this? The Agreed Framework, when fully implemented, would have normalised relations between the two countries, or have come close to it. Events had not moved that far four years later. The appointment was a reaction to a North Korean long-range missile test that overflew Japan on August 31, and caused considerable consternation in that country.
In effect, it offered North Korea a choice: improved overall relations with the United States in return for abandoning its missile programme; failing that, continuing confrontation with America and a probable worsening economic and security situation for North Korea.
J James E. President Clinton apparently gave careful thought to a visit of his own. What went wrong? The answers are various and typically depend on the political orientation of the analyst.
They are simply not to be trusted. As the Wall Street Journal editorial writers put it in a recent comment, once President Bush has proved his mettle in Iraq, he can turn with a strengthened hand to North Korea. These people urge direct talks with North Korea to resolve the nuclear crisis before it is too late.
There may also be another school of thought in Washington and Secretary of State Colin Powell may have been speaking for it when he announced last December that North Korea already had two nuclear weapons and then fatalistically implied that it would not make much difference if it had a few more.
Was he simply trying to postpone a Korean crisis while the Iraqi crisis was still at white heat? But perhaps, too, he subscribes to the views of many analysts that North Korea is a failed state which will collapse sooner or later. In the meantime, it is contained on all sides by more powerful states.
Its nuclear bombs may be a deterrent against an attack that will never happen anyway but otherwise they are useless. When the regime ultimately collapses the nuclear weapons will be inherited by South Korea, a friend who might then destroy them but, even if retained, the weapons would not be a threat to the United States. There is some truth to be found in each of these analyses. And there is certainly some continuity between the actions of Kim Jong Il and his father.
The North Korean leadership has not found it possible to open the country to outside influences, except on a strictly controlled basis, obviously thinking of the examples of Eastern Europe. Ending the confrontation with South Korea and the United States, even in return for generous compensation, has probably been seen as a threat to the survival of the regime. Faced with the loss in of its main external supporter, the Soviet Union, Kim Il Sung temporarily opted for a policy of reconciliation with the South.
Two important agreements with the Republic of Korea were concluded: one, a comprehensive basic agreement, promised across-the-board cooperation, including in the military sphere, between the two parts of the Korean peninsula; the second declared that neither country would allow nuclear weapons on its soil. The nuclear crisis grew worse until when it was resolved, temporarily it now appears, by the Agreed Framework. An intercession by former US President Jimmy Carter and the threat of US military action by the Clinton administration was necessary before Kim Il Sung agreed to halt his plutonium-producing nuclear facilities.
Two light-water, proliferation-resistant nuclear reactors, and annual shipments of heavy fuel oil to North Korea by the United States were part of the price. By all accounts, the North Koreans kept their side of the bargain in the narrow sense that everything they agreed to do at Yongbyon was done.
But the construction of the new reactors lagged years behind the target date for completion, partly because of unrelated provocations by North Korea, and the promised political normalisation never occurred.
From the North Korean perspective, this probably looked like a US failure to live up to its commitments. The truth is, North Korea did little to encourage good will in Washington and there was little support in Congress for showing good will towards the despotic government of North Korea. It was even difficult to maintain the shipments of heavy fuel oil that the US had agreed to provide to compensate for the shut-down of the Yongbyon reactor.
And yet, both Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il have made some efforts to become more engaged with the world, the son even more so than the father. And it has to be said that for a long time the world has not been very receptive to North Korean overtures. The North Korean regime is one of the most repressive in the world.
After this, they walked back onto South Korean soil. Mr Kim said their meeting was a symbol of their "excellent" friendship. Mr Trump said it was a "great day for the world". The two leaders were only due to meet for a short time, but they ended up speaking with each other for about an hour and agreed to restart talks about denuclearisation , which had stalled. In a news conference, Mr Trump confirmed that he had invited Mr Kim to the White House, but nothing has been formally arranged.
North Korea has continued to test missiles since then, and the two countries still sometimes use unfriendly language and insults to each other. However in , Mr Trump has said the two leaders have a "good relationship" and in March he sent a letter to Mr Kim offering US help in tackling coronavirus. Escaped from North Korea: 'I love telling my story'. North Korea: The girls who escaped. Worst drought in years for North Korea. US places sanctions on North Korea after Sony hack.
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This picture shows tanks being displayed during a military parade. Who's in charge? Kim Jong-un is the current leader of North Korea.
What is life like in North Korea? North Koreans watch a huge screen broadcasting an official announcement by a TV news presenter. North Korean people dance during an event to mark the 85th anniversary of the country's army. Why are people worried about North Korea? This US aircraft carrier was sent to waters near North Korea.
How have relations changed? The hotline in the village of Panmunjom. Getty Images. The two leaders walked across the demarcation line between North and South Korea. More like this. North Korea: The girls who escaped 9 Jul 9 July Worst drought in years for North Korea 19 Jun 19 June
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