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DPRK Reacts to U.S. Demands to Disarm
In a sharp outburst Thursday, DPRK threatened to scrap missile and nuclear accords with Washington and railed against the Bush administration's plans for a missile defense system.
The new U.S. administration's foreign and national security teams are increasingly adopting a "hard-line stance" toward Pyongyang, DPRK Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried in English on KCNA, the country's foreign news outlet.
Washington wants Pyongyang "to totally disarm itself first. The U.S. is seriously mistaken if it thinks that Pyongyang will accept its demand," it said.
The statement is a clear warning to President Bush, four months after then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and DPRK leader Kim Jong Il toasted one another at state banquets in Pyongyang, capital of the communist nation.
While the fundamentals of U.S. policy toward North Korea remain unaltered, there was a marked shift in tone after Bush took office. His senior aides seemed more wary about the prospect of progress and more assertive about the need for concrete gestures of reconciliation from Pyongyang.
And shortly before taking over Albright's job in January, Colin Powell referred to Kim as a "dictator" during a U.S. Senate confirmation hearing.
On Thursday, Pyongyang said it might abandon a moratorium on long-range missile tests, as well as a 1994 accord under which it froze its suspected nuclear weapons program in exchange for the construction by a U.S.-led consortium of two nuclear reactors. Delays have plagued the project.
Thursday's statement could heighten scrutiny of the alliance between Washington and Seoul, which closely coordinate DPRK policy. Some South Korean officials worry privately that a sterner stance from Washington would jeopardize engagement with the North.
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