U.N. Balks at U.S. Bid to Condemn N. Korea

The Security Council on Wednesday held its first discussion of North Korea’s nuclear arms program. The council expressed its concern, but a U.S. effort for a condemnation of the Pyongyang government’s withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was blocked by China.

After the closed-door consultations, the Bush administration again stressed that it wanted a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

“I think we’re getting somewhere on the diplomatic front with North Korea,” Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times in Washington. He declined to provide details.

Powell said North Korea’s actions affect not only the United States but also South Korea, Japan and China, which must all take part in a solution.

North Korea has sought direct talks with the U.S. instead of a regional approach.

Referring to himself as “Mr. Multilateral,” Powell said he is “more persuaded today than I was when we started that our position is a correct one.”

He said the United States is making sure there is “no confusion” in North Korea’s capital of Pyongyang about U.S. policy -- an apparent reference to the divisions between Russia, China and the United States on how hard to push the isolated Stalinist country.

Russia and China have argued that reprimanding North Korea will only backfire.

North Korea’s leadership has warned it would consider any economic sanctions voted by the Security Council as a war-like act.

Powell said the U.S. has been in “fairly regular contact” with the North Koreans. “They know our views. We’re going to stick with our policy.”

The North Koreans have made it clear they fear they are next for a U.S. attack after Iraq.

But Powell, asked whether the Bush administration intended to take on other nations, replied that “all of these nations -- Syria, Iran, others -- should realize that pursuing weapons of mass destruction or supporting terrorist activities is not in their interest.”

“That doesn’t mean that war is coming to them; it just means the world is changing,” Powell said.

“We have many ways of dealing with the challenges that we face.”

In recent weeks, senior U.S. officials have said possible scenarios against North Korea might include economic sanctions or intercepting ships loaded with North Korean missiles destined for sale to other nations.

But these officials stressed such moves would be contemplated only if diplomacy failed -- and they expect it to succeed.

Reflecting the sensitivity of the issue, John D. Negroponte, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, read from a prepared text when he spoke with reporters after the council’s consultations.

Negroponte said Washington welcomed the council’s discussion.

But the ambassador warned that North Korea’s behavior has “cast a shadow over the Korean peninsula and is a concern to the entire international community.”

“It is not just a matter of getting the North to give up its nuclear weapons,” Negroponte said.

“North Korea must also accept a viable verification regime. This would include cooperation, declarations, inspections and monitoring.”

The United States had been working for weeks to persuade council members to issue a statement criticizing North Korea, which announced last year that it was reactivating a nuclear enrichment plant. Subsequently, it expelled monitors from the International Atomic Energy Agency.

But the Bush administration’s effort stalled after China said a statement would complicate diplomacy.

During consultations Wednesday, China’s U.N. ambassador, Wang Yingfan, twice told council members that his nation only wanted the council to express its concern. Russia’s ambassador, Sergei Lavrov, made it clear that he supported China’s position.

“Russia did not ask for this meeting,” Lavrov said pointedly as he strode into the meeting. “Condemnations would not help,” he said, stressing the need for “a direct dialogue between the United States and North Korea.”

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the next step should be to “get the parties talking and to find a format that will be acceptable to both parties and bring them to the table to talk.”

In recent weeks, there has been at least one low-level meeting between U.S. and North Korean diplomats.

U.S. special envoy Jack Pritchard met March 31 with North Korea’s deputy in New York in what one source described as a meeting to “talk about talking.”

“It is something positive, maybe not much, but it is movement,” said Moon Chung In, a professor at Yonsei University in Seoul who is an informal advisor to the South Korean government.

In other developments, the White House announced Wednesday that South Korea’s new president, Roh Moo Hyun, is coming to Washington on May 14 to meet with President Bush.

Roh’s office said the leaders “will hold in-depth discussions to forge a common stance on bringing about a peaceful resolution to the North Korean nuclear issue.”

North Korea watchers said they were heartened as well by the fact that Pyongyang has not yet started up a factory that reprocesses spent fuel rods into weapons-grade plutonium.

“I still have some optimism that the North Koreans have not irrevocably decided to go the way of nuclear weapons,” said Donald Gregg, a former U.S. ambassador to South Korea and head of the Korea Society in New York.

One reason North Korea might have backed off is increased pressure from China, North Korea’s most important ally. China reportedly cut off an oil pipeline into North Korea last month for three days in what was said to be a pointed message to the North Koreans.

South Korea quietly lobbied members of the Security Council not to issue a tough statement on North Korea, fearing such a move would jeopardize nascent efforts at talks.

“North Korea has not crossed the red line yet, and any Security Council resolution would only make things worse,” said Moon of Yonsei University. “The best thing we can hope for is for the U.N. not to do anything.”

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Goldman reported from the United Nations, Demick from Seoul, and Efron from Washington.