First this:

Tong Kim, then a high-level interpreter for the U.S. State Department, was in the room. “What we said then was, we have convincing evidence. We said they were pursuing it. We didn’t say how far they went, we didn’t say they are producing HEU bombs,” Kim said.

Kim, now an international relations professor here in Seoul, says North Korean officials acknowledged the program - something they have never done publicly, and which they now deny. He believes Pyongyang thought, erroneously, the acknowledgment would enhance their bargaining leverage with the United States. (emphasis added)

Then this:

Tong Kim, the former State Department interpreter, calls the HEU program accusations a “self-inflicted sticking point” by the United States. He says Washington is hoping to receive some form of explanation from North Korea, so the diplomatic process can move forward.

“What I would expect would be that North Koreans somehow would come up with an explanation of what they have bought and what they did with them - again, claiming that those materials, or their plan, had nothing to do with a weapons program,” Kim said.

If, as Kim says, North Korean officials did indeed admit to the HEU program, then why does he refer to the issues as a “self-inflicted sticking point” by the U.S.? Should the U.S. take the evidence and the admission – a complete breach of the 1994 Agreed Framework – and do. . . nothing? Keep giving the North fuel oil while they setup an enrichment facility?

Once again this is attributing North Korea’s actions as somehow being the responsibility of the U.S., which I find patently asinine.

Note: Kim’s article in September 2005 on language intricacies did not exhibit such illogical conclusions.