U.S. Warns N. Korea: Patience Running Out

A top White House adviser has personally delivered a pointed message to North Korean officials, urging them to act on a nuclear disarmament pledge and telling them that U.S. patience is limited, a U.S. official said.

Victor Cha, President Bush's top adviser on North Korea, told North Korean officials in New York City on Tuesday that frustration is rising 10 days after the North missed a deadline to shut down its main nuclear reactor, according to a senior U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

The North Koreans said they would convey the message to officials in Pyongyang, the U.S. official said.

Cha is a deputy negotiator at the talks with North Korea that include Japan, China, Russia, the United States and South Korea. He traveled to New York with Sung Kim, the State Department's director of Korean affairs, the U.S. official said.

The State Department occasionally sends messages to Pyongyang through North Korean officials at the United Nations in New York, but it is unusual for a White House official to make the trip and indicates the importance the Bush administration attaches to making progress on the issue.

In an interview aired Tuesday on PBS, President Bush said that the U.S. cannot directly prod Pyongyang to shut down its reactor by way of withholding monetary aid, "because we don't have any aid."

But, added Mr. Bush, "the Chinese can, or the South Koreans can." The president thanked South Korean leader Roh Moo-Hyun for being "so stalwart" in denying millions of dollars in aid to the North as a means of prompting the reclusive communist government to comply.

North Korea pledged in February to begin abandoning its nuclear program in return for energy aid and political concessions, but it missed an April 14 deadline to shut down its nuclear reactor. The North has refused to act until it receives $25 million in cash frozen after a Macau bank was blacklisted by the United States for allegedly helping the North with money laundering and counterfeiting.

The funds have been freed for withdrawal, but for unknown reasons the North has not yet acted to recover the money.

In Seoul, however, South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon said Wednesday the dispute over the funds was nearing a resolution.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il reviewed a massive military parade featuring dozens of missiles in Pyongyang to mark the army's anniversary Wednesday, in a display of might amid the tensions over the country's nuclear weapons.

Kim Jong Il is a "rational" man, but the country is headed in the wrong direction, Japan's prime minister told cable television network CNN ahead of his visit this week to the United States.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who heads to the U.S. April 26 for a summit with President Bush, described to CNN his impression of Kim based on a meeting with him in 2002.

"I regard Mr. Kim Jong Il as a person who is capable of rational thinking. I believe a policy of dialogue and pressure vis-a-vis the North will be effective," CNN quoted Abe as saying.

The Cha meeting in New York followed a visit Monday to Washington by South Korea's envoy at international nuclear talks, Chun Yung-woo. Chun said the United States and South Korea are frustrated with North Korea's failure to meet disarmament obligations but are willing to give the North more time.

"There's no ultimatum," the U.S. official said of the Cha meeting. "But there is a degree of frustration among all parties."

The North Korean issue will be a topic of discussion when Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visits Washington on Thursday for talks with Bush.

Also Tuesday, U.S. Army Gen. B.B. Bell, the head of U.S. forces in South Korea, told lawmakers that North Korea could become a "moderate nuclear power" by 2010 if current disarmament negotiations fail.

Leader Kim Jong Il's government, Bell told the Senate Armed Services Committee, views its ballistic missile program as a source of international prestige and regional influence, a deterrent against attack and a means of generating money from exports.

As a result, he said in testimony, the North continues to produce missiles "and may ultimately aim to develop nuclear armed missiles to threaten regional countries and even the U.S."

Separately, Robert Joseph, the State Department's senior arms control official until last month, said the United States could be prolonging the life of the regime in Pyongyang as North Korean leaders pretend to give up their nuclear weapons in exchange for energy aid.

Joseph urged the five nations to hold back concessions until the North fully and irreversibly dismantles its nuclear program.

Calling North Korea "the most repressive, the most totalitarian government on the face of the earth," Joseph said North Korea recognizes that joining the international community would mean the end of the regime's absolute power over its people.