Hasten Talks With N. Korea

In the latest in a series of dangerous moves, North Korea last week officially became the first nation ever to withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The nations most directly concerned, including the United States and China, should quicken efforts to engage Pyongyang in negotiations to keep the secretive Stalinist regime from developing the capacity to manufacture the world’s most destructive weapons.

North Korea announced its intention three months ago to withdraw from the pact signed by nearly 200 nations. It claimed the United States was using the treaty in efforts to disarm the regime of Kim Jong Il. North Korea also has expelled United Nations inspectors, leading the International Atomic Energy Agency to send the issue of the nuclear program to the U.N. Security Council.

Last week’s Security Council meeting on the matter was reminiscent of its ineffectual sessions on the issue of disarming Iraq. This time, China deserves the blame. Beijing is the main supplier of aid to deeply impoverished North Korea and has valid concerns that a government collapse would flood China with refugees. But its refusal to let the Security Council even issue a statement condemning Pyongyang’s actions could lead North Korea to believe it can pursue nuclear weapons with impunity.

North Korea is thought to already have one or two atomic weapons. Since admitting in October to having an enriched uranium program -- while insisting the program was only for peaceful purposes -- it has kicked out the inspectors, withdrawn from the treaty and restarted a reactor. In February, as a new president was about to take office in South Korea, North Korea test-fired a missile for the first time in three years.

The Chinese did temporarily suspend oil shipments to North Korea and are said by South Koreans to be playing a quiet diplomatic role. That’s fine, but so far there are no discernable results.

For its part, Washington had long said it would not conduct high-level talks with North Korea until the nation allowed inspectors back in, dismantled the plutonium-based weapons program and stopped the enriched uranium-based atomic weapons development it secretly began in violation of a 1994 agreement. Now the Bush administration has relented, saying it will talk with North Korea if other nations are involved. North Korea insists it will talk only with the U.S., but the Bush stance is realistic and deserves support by China, Russia, Japan and South Korea.

A six-nation conference would give both the U.S. and North Korea what they want, and China and Russia should pressure Pyongyang to attend. South Korea’s U.S. ambassador, Sung-Chul Yang, said last week that his nation believed that persuasion and dialogue were better than confrontation when dealing with Pyongyang. Good, but only if North Korea’s neighbors and allies can persuade it that dialogue requires a partner.