Return to six-party talks?

Return to six-party talks?

Mark Fitzpatrick, a former US State Department official, now with the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, agrees “the compromise came out entirely because China would not accept a condemnation.” Still, he adds, “it is likely to defuse tensions for the time being.”

In what appears to be a calculated campaign to gain diplomatic momentum and international recognition as a nuclear power, North Korea also is expressing an interest in returning to six-nation talks on its nuclear weapons program for the first time since December 2008. North Korea has called for talks “on an equal footing” in order to achieve “denuclearization” of the entire Korean peninsula – the same language the North has used in the run-up to previous agreements.

China, as North Korea’s ally and the source of most of its food aid, has also called for resumption of the talks, urging all sides “to remain calm” and “move quickly to the next page of the Cheonan incident.”

The Chinese appear still more concerned about antisubmarine warfare exercises that the South Koreans and Americans say they still plan to hold in the waters off South Korea. South Korean defense officials for weeks have been pressing the Americans to agree to stage the exercises in the Yellow Sea, the same general area in which an investigation concluded that a North Korean midget submarine fired the torpedo that sank the Cheonan on March 26.

China clearly views any show of force in the Yellow Sea, the large body of water between the Korean Peninsula and the Chinese mainland, as an act of intimidation. As a Chinese Foreign Ministry official put it, China “resolutely opposes” any such activities “that affect China’s security interests.”

South Korean officials, responding to complaints from China, now say they may hold the exercises in waters off the Korean Peninsula’s southern or eastern coasts. US officials have said US ships will participate but have yet to confirm whether the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier George Washington will lead the flotilla.

In any case, US diplomats have been assuring the Chinese the war games are to sharpen the skills of South Koreans in combating North Korean submarine attacks and are not intended to offend Chinese sensitivities.

The exercises, even if held in the Yellow Sea, will be well south of the Northern Limit Line (NLL), set by the UN Command in South Korea after the Korean War, below which North Korean vessels are banned. The Cheonan was sunk just south of the NLL, in waters that have been the scene of bloody battles between North and South Korean vessels in June 1999 and June 2002.

Analysts remain uncertain, however, of the long-range repercussions of compromise in the aftermath of the waffling UN statement and the uncertainty of how to deal with both China and North Korea.