So it appears that we're giving that pot-bellied, little, platform-shoe wearing dick-tator Kim Jong
mentally-IL yet another chance at becoming an upstanding and responsible member of the global community. I think that this guy is about as trustworthy and reliable as a hooker at the corner of Clairmont Avenue and Buford Highway and he's as safe as any given Chinese restaurant in DeKalb County. I can't believe that the Bush Administration is falling for the same bullshit story that Madelyn
Half-bright did as Clinton's Secretary of State. Negotiating with Kim Jong-Il adds a whole new dimension to Reagan's tried but true policy of "Trust but verify". I still vividly recall seeing her happily clinking champagne glasses with this tyrant after giving them two light water reactors on their promise not to develop nuclear weapons.
And the report that North Korea turned over does not explain what they are doing or did with the uranium that they did develop nor their relations with Syria. Laughable.
And what are we going to threaten them with this time?
This whole non-sense reminds me of that exchange between Kim Jong Il and Hans Blix in "Team America World Police":
Kim Jong Il: Hans Brix? Oh no! Oh, hi Hans! Great to see you again!
Hans Blix: Mr. Il, I was supposed to be allowed to inspect your palace today, but your guards won't let me enter certain areas.
Kim Jong Il: Hans, Hans, Hans! We've been frew this a dozen times. I don't have any weapons of mass destwuction, OK Hans?
Hans Blix: Then let me look around, so I can ease the UN's collective mind. I'm sorry, but the UN must be firm with you. Let me in, or else.
Kim Jong Il: Or else what?
Hans Blix: Or else we will be very angry with you... and we will write you a letter, telling you how angry we are.
Kim Jong Il: OK, Hans. I'll show you. Stand to your reft.
...
Of course, the North Koreans probably have TigersX on their watch list now that I've criticized them...again...in this forum.
Anyway, the real story, this from USA Today and the AP and as usual all emphasis (and sub-text) is my own:
Bush administration to lift North Korea sanctions
Contributing: Richard Wolf, in Washington; Douglas Stanglin in McLean, Va.; The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — President Bush announced Thursday that he will lift U.S. economic sanctions against North Korea — a charter member of the "axis of evil" — and remove it from the U.S. terrorism blacklist now that Pyongyang has met a key requirement of its promise to abandon its nuclear weapons program.
Bush, in a State of the Union address in 2002, first labeled North Korea, Iraq and Iran members of the "axis" for what he said was support of terrorism and efforts to develop weapons of mass destruction.
The president's announcement, in a Rose Garden meeting with reporters, came after North Korea turned over an accounting of its nuclear work to China, which is a member of the six-party talks set up to pressure North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions.
Bush called the move, which comes six months late, an important breakthrough in the 5-year-old negotiations, but cautioned it was only the first step in a series of commitments North Korea must fulfill.
"We will trust you only to the extent you fulfill your promises," Bush said. "I'm pleased with the progress. I'm under no illusions. This is the first step. This isn't the end of the process. It is the beginning of the process."
Specifically, Bush said the U.S. would erase trade sanctions under the Trading With the Enemy Act, and notify Congress that, in 45 days, it intends to take North Korea off the State Department list of nations that sponsor terrorism.
"If North Korea continues to make the right choices it can repair its relationship with the international community … If North Korea makes the wrong choices, the United States and its partners in the six-party talks will act accordingly," Bush said.
The talks, involving North Korea, China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States, first convened in 2003.
"The United States has no illusions about the regime in Pyongyang," Bush said. "We remain deeply concerned about North Korea's human rights abuses, uranium enrichment activities, nuclear testing and proliferation, ballistic missile programs, and the threat it continues to pose to South Korea and its neighbors."
The declaration does not include detailed information about North Korea's suspected program of developing weapons fueled by enriched uranium nor does it spell out how any cooperation with Syria on its alleged nuclear program.
Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., chairman of the Foreign Relations committee, welcomed the announcement but said "a lot of tough work lies ahead."
Biden said it was critical to get a clear picture of North Korea's full nuclear program and its cooperation with Syria and other countries on nuclear programs.
"Without clarity on these issues we cannot proceed with confidence to the next phase of the negotiations — the dismantlement of North Korea's nuclear facilities and the removal of any fissile material from the country," he said.
"It certainly keeps the diplomatic process alive and moving forward," said Ted Galen Carpenter, vice president for defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute. "This is a good thing because the alternatives are too horrid to contemplate."
Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee,said that during the verification period "we must keep diplomatic and economic pressure" on North Korea to meet all of its obligations, include full denuclearization.
"If we are unable to fully verify the declaration submitted today and if I am not satisfied with the verification mechanisms developed, I would not support the easing of sanctions on North Korea," he said in a statement.
Sen. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, called the developments "a step forward, and there will be many more steps to take in the days ahead. Critical questions remain unanswered. We still have not verified the accuracy of the North Korean declaration. We must confirm the full extent of North Korea's past plutonium production. We must also confirm its uranium enrichment activities, and get answers to disturbing questions about its proliferation activities with other countries, including Syria.
Lawrence Korb, an assistant secretary of defense in the Reagan administration, called the developments "the beginning of a more realistic foreign policy which says you've got to negotiate with your enemies."
WTF?! Like Israel negotiated with the PLO?! Fat lot of fucking good that did!
To underscore its commitments, North Korea is expected to televise live the blowing up of an already disabled 65-foot-tall cooling tower at its main nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.
Bush emphasized that other sanctions against North Korea will remain. He said the U.S. action would have little impact on North Korea's financial and diplomatic isolation. "It will remain one of the most heavily sanctioned nations in the world," Bush said. All U.N. sanctions, for example, will remain in place.
Bush also said the United States would monitor North Korea closely and "if they don't fulfill their promises, more restrictions will be placed on them."
Bush said that to end its isolation, North Korea must, for instance, dismantle all of its nuclear facilities and resolve outstanding questions on its highly enriched uranium and proliferation activities "and end these activities in a way that we can fully verify."
Conservative Republicans — once Bush's closest allies in efforts to confront North Korea's nuclear aspirations — came out strongly against his decision.
"It's shameful," John Bolton, Bush's former U.S. ambassador at the United Nations, said of the president's decision. "This represents the final collapse of Bush's foreign policy."
"Profound disappointment," was the reaction of Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, asked if the latest talks means North Korea will give up the nuclear bombs it has already built, said Pyongyang "may or may not" abandon them.
"But frankly, this is the only way we're going to find out, if we keep probing, if we keep testing,...." Rice told reporters.
North Korea was put on the list of nations that sponsor terrorism for its alleged involvement in the 1987 bombing of a South Korean airliner that killed 115 people. The designation has effectively blocked North Korea from receiving low-interest loans from the World Bank and other international lending agencies.
Here's the link:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-06-26-north-korea-nuclear_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip
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