In October last year State department spokesman Richard Boucher informed a stunned international audience of North Korean (DPRK) "confession" to Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly of its continuing programme "to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons in violation of Agreed Framework and other agreements' e.g. Non-proliferation treaty, its IAEA safeguards agreements, and joint North-South Declaration on Denuclearisation of Korean peninsula. A few days later joint US-Japan-South Korea Trilateral statement called upon DPRK to dismantle the programme in a prompt and verifiable manner and to come into compliance with all its international commitments. Both statements committed the three countries to resolve the matter peacefully. But some analysts found the DPRK confession not only unapologetic but its response to international criticism was characterised by mounting belligerence. Joshua Muravchik of American Enterprise Institute for example argued that if the North Koreans could not be stopped now, despite US' unsuccessful efforts for the last twenty years, then the world faced the prospect of DPRK becoming in Richard Perle's phrase " the nuclear bread basket of the world" or at least of the underworld of the failed states and terrorists.

Muravchik chronicled North Korean efforts to build weapon grade nuclear reactor in 1979; it signed NPT in 1985 under Soviet pressure; refused to sign IAEA safeguard agreement till 1989 on the plea that it would not sign unless South Korea agreed to turn Korean peninsula into a nuclear free zone( which ROK did); then added the demand that annual joint ROK-US military exercise be scrapped( President Bush announced his decision to withdraw nuclear weapons from South Korea in 1991 and to cancel joint military exercises). Meanwhile South Korea launched its "sunshine policy" of friendship with DPRK; unilaterally renounced the manufacture, possession or use of nuclear or chemical weapons; and signed a non-aggression pact with the North. Unfortunately while these positive steps were being taken, DPRK continued its nuclear programme in complete secrecy. When in November 1993 President Clinton announced that DPRK would not be allowed to develop nuclear bomb, CIA had assessed that the North already had one or two. Clinton Defence Secretary was resolute that he would rather risk a war now than face an even greater catastrophe several years hence. State department, however, was not so sanguine that the point of no return had arrived.

The mounting tension was diffused by a visit to Pyongyang by President Carter who found Kim IL-Sung being revered and treated "as a combination of George Washington. Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln". He also found Kim "very friendly towards Christianity, vigorous, intelligent, surprisingly well informed and very frank". Carter's visit paved the foundation for Agreed Framework under which DPRK would freeze its existing plutonium programme and in return would receive two light water reactors and pending their completion half million metric tons of heavy oil annually. Such Faustian bargain was made in the hope that North Korea's economic difficulties would lead to regime change and result in Korean unification a la Germany. Nothing happened and the father Kim II-sung was succeeded by his son Kim Jong-II. On the other hand the agreement set a dangerous precedent by rewarding Pyongyang for her defiance and could encourage future proliferation of WMD.

North Korean perfidy having been established it is difficult to chart a course to restrain DPRK if its goal is to possess nuclear weapons. Already isolated further isolation may have marginal effects as would any strict sanctions regime by the UNSC given our experiences with sanction busting in other cases. War is hardly an option and is implicitly regarded by the Bush administration as "unthinkable". North Korea has hundreds of thousands of soldiers and thousands of artillery pieces are believed to be arrayed in and around DMZ. These shells can reach Seoul in a matter of minutes causing deaths of thousands of South Koreans and US troops stationed there. It is not beyond North Korean leadership to use nuclear weapons causing incalculable damages.

The obvious question facing the US is what to do? It is generally believed that only China has the greatest leverage as the sole fuel supplier to DPRK due to suspension of oil supply by the US consequent upon North Korean infringement of the Agreed Framework. Fortunately Chinese policy has consistently favoured a denuclearised Korean peninsula. China is also apprehensive that in case of disappearance of DPRK the Americans would move in to fill the vacuum and thereby come closer to the Chinese border. Ellen Bork at the Project of the New American Century is skeptical of Chinese help to the US because of divergent interest of the two regarding DPRK and has advised removal of China from the list of countries for "constructive engagement" by the US for solution of international crises. At this point one could also recall the 1999Armitage Report( now Deputy Secretary of State) prepared by a panel also including Paul Wilfowitz( now Deputy Secretary of Defence) which concluded that the lesson for Pyongyang over the last four years was that brinkmanship paid. The report warned that the 1994 agreement had only created a cycle that would lead Pyongyang to believe that it could extract concessions. Wilfowitz expressed his doubts that a regime which cared so little for its own people except enhancing its military capabilities would be willing to give up the ultimate weapons in exchange for power reactors. Armitage report recommended various force enhancement measures relating to ROK and Japan and called for identification of a "redline" which would trigger response should DPRK decide to cross it.

Attacks on North Korean nuclear sites was not considered because there was no "neat and safe military operation that in some antiseptic way could eliminate North Korean nuclear problem" and also fearing the North's devastating retaliation against the South. Again the US was back to square one. Recently on 23rd May President Bush and Prime Minister Koizumi made it abundantly clear that the US and Japan would not tolerate nuclear weapons in DPRK; they would not give in to blackmail and would not settle for anything less than complete, verifiable and irreversible elimination of North Korean nuclear weapons programme. They praised the role played by China in the recent US-China-DPRK meting at Beijing and expressed the hope that future meetings would also include Japan and South Korea. The point of departure here is that DPRK would have liked to hold bilateral talks with the US which the US had refused flat out and would like other concerned countries -- Japan and South Korea -- to be included in the talks.

At the Bush Texas ranch meeting Koizumi was at pains to convey that in essence all parties wanted peaceful resolution of the problem lest the isolated dictator at Pyongyang got the impression that the Texas talks was a mini council of war. On 24th May DPRK accepted the US demand to include Japan and South Korea in the future talks. According to a statement issued North Korea did not find "the format of the talks itself as an essential issue if the US truly wanted to settle the problem". It is the first time that DPRK has agreed to a five-way multilateral format to deal with the nuclear issue. This softening of North Korean stance could have resulted from the tough stand taken by President Bush at his Texas ranch meeting with Koizumi that US would refuse to be blackmailed and would insist on a complete, verifiable and irreversible elimination of North Korean nuclear programme. This message along with those sent to Syria and now Iran must not have been lost on Kim Jong-II who has seen the disastrous results of the failed deceptive diplomacy of Saddam Hussein.

Since the carrot and stick policy appears to be in order in this case some (e.g.Henry Soloski of the Non-proliferation policy education centre in May 2003 Arms Control Association publication) have suggested that Bush administration has to cut off illicit flow of cash to DPRK army; that it blocks North Korean and other proliferators from exporting WMD; and that the UN should toughen the non-proliferation regime. Otherwise in a decade or more the world would be crowded with hostile suspected nuclear states some of which may be willing to trade with or unable to stop trade with terrorist organisations.

Kazi Anwarul Masud a former Secretary and Ambassador.