Importance of the North Korean deal

Korean false dawns have been seen before, but yesterday morning's announcement of an agreement in the six-way talks on North …

Korean false dawns have been seen before, but yesterday morning's announcement of an agreement in the six-way talks on North Korea's nuclear programme should be an important first step in removing nuclear weapons and lowering tension in the peninsula and region.

It brings us back to a similar deal, the Agreed Framework, reached in 1994 during the Clinton administration but renounced eight years later during the Bush administration, and then to September 2005, when the Pyongyang government pledged to dismantle its entire nuclear programme but did nothing more about it. Yesterday's tentative agreement sets out in concrete terms the first stages of implementation of that 2005 accord.

Under the new deal the North Koreans will shut the Yongbyon reactor complex at the heart of their nuclear programme and allow international inspectors on to the site. Pyongyang's implementation will be closely and sceptically monitored. In return, North Korea will be provided energy assistance and aid, which will probably be funded primarily by South Korea, the US, and Japan. The latter, however, remains adamant it will not find cash for aid unless there is progress on the separate issue of its nationals who have been abducted by North Korea. The agreement is precarious.

A second phase of discussions, also lubricated by further oil supplies and sanction reductions, is likely to be as arduous and will address further denuclearisation, including North Korea's existing nuclear weapons and the plutonium fuel already produced at Yongbyon, energy requirements, diplomatic recognition, timing and financial sanctions, among other issues. North Korea is estimated currently to have enough plutonium for as many as 13 nuclear weapons.

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In October last, by testing its first nuclear bomb Pyongyang had seriously antagonised its neighbours, China and South Korea, both advocates of a policy of engagement. The UN Security Council had then voted unanimously to enact sanctions. The squeeze on Pyongyang has been tightened by its own chronic energy crisis, a generation capacity that can meet only half its needs, and a decrepit national grid. The Stalinist state has been negotiating from a position of extreme economic and political weakness, its population on the verge of starvation.

It needs this deal. Reneging now on its commitment might well be in character, but could also be suicidal. The agreement is a significant achievement for multilateral diplomacy, involving both Koreas, the US, Japan, Russia, and host China. US engagement reflected an important and welcome pragmatic policy u-turn by an administration already facing confrontation on several fronts. President Bush may indeed face some critical flak from neocons like former UN ambassador, Mr John Bolton, who regards the deal as rewarding North Korea for bad behaviour and an invitation for others to do likewise. That view, hopefully, is unlikely to sway a Democratic Congress when it comes to vote the cash.