Don’t Play North Korea’s Game

President Clinton is mulling a visit to North Korea before he leaves office Jan. 20, in hopes of nailing down a framework agreement to freeze Pyongyang’s missile production and end its missile exports. A presidential trip would be an enormous propaganda coup for Kim Jong Il’s long-isolated and deservedly scorned regime, and it is no surprise that Kim has made it a condition for reaching a missile agreement. It’s time for the United States to stop being a player in this game of political extortion. Clinton should pass up the chance to become the first American president to journey to Pyongyang and leave to the incoming Bush administration the task of dealing with North Korea.

American diplomats have been trying to figure out how seriously to take Pyongyang’s hinted willingness to end missile development if the United States and other countries provide it with free satellite launching services. It’s a complex matter because a deal that did not allow unfettered and continuing U.S. inspections in North Korea would be worthless. There has been no sign that North Korea would accept such terms.

Missiles are only one item on the agenda. The North has made a few gestures toward detente on the Korean peninsula, most notably opening its doors for last summer’s visit to Pyongyang by South Korean President Kim Dae Jung. But it has significantly failed to follow through with any tangible steps to otherwise reduce tensions, refusing, for example, to thin out its massive concentration of troops and weapons along the demilitarized zone separating the two countries. Domestically, it has done nothing to improve its appalling human rights record. North Korea may be eager to be accepted into the community of nations, but it is far from ready to be legitimized by a visit from an American president.