Perceptions of North Korean Negotiations
by Richardson ~ March 22nd, 2007. Filed under: Diplomacy, Economics, Engagement, Six-Party Talks.[Note; updates on news reports below.] The battle to actually do something substantial about North Korea is in no small way related to public perception of that reality, a lesson learned in Vietnam and well used by opposition in Iraq. Shallow and often contextually inaccurate headline news, and perceptions/analysis based on headlines rather than the big picture, is the reality. Some of that perception translates into political capital, positive or negative. While Korea watchers know the facts, just a few weeks ago much of the debate around North Korea focused on the questions of whether or not U.S. intelligence on HEU was correct, and on whether the U.S. would continue to hold up “diplomacy.”
But by actually sitting down at the negotiating table with North Korea, we’ve given them enough rope to give credibility (to those who doubt/doubted) for pursuing strangulation, and they’ve started on the noose already. By making the 13 February deal and abiding by it, the focus has begun to shift back to North Korea as the troublemaker:
“North Korea has avoided discussing. . .”
“North Korean envoy Kim Kye-gwan did not talk to reporters. . .”
“ ‘It’s a shame to use this as a reason to not take part in negotiations for two days. It’s really a waste, especially with everyone gathered there. . .’ ”
“[T]he Bank of China had refused to accept the transfer and a diplomatic source said China did not want to play a role in getting “dirty money” back to impoverished North Korea. . .”
“North Korea has been unwilling to engage with the other parties . . . on substantive issues of its nuclear program. . .”
Even South Korea is blaming the north:
Some envoys expressed irritation with the delays. “What’s happened is utterly absurd and outrageous that nobody anticipated,” Chun Yung-woo, of South Korea, told reporters.
China appears to be bumbling, with bank and foreign ministry officials contradicting each other, and Macau refusing to even comment:
The Bank of China denied Thursday that it was told to accept US$25 million (€18.81 million) in North Korean funds that were frozen at a blacklisted Macau lender accused of laundering money for the North.
[…]
But Li Lihui, the bank’s vice chairman and president, said the bank wasn’t asked to handle the funds. “I can tell you that up until now, we were not asked to deal with this business,” he told reporters while announcing the bank’s 2006 earnings in Hong Kong.
Li’s comment didn’t square with remarks made by chief Chinese envoy Wu Dawei, who said the state-run bank was discussing the matter. “The Bank of China has concerns (about accepting the money) and not all the concerns have been assuaged,” Wu said in Beijing.
[…]
Another Bank of China official, Wang Zhaowen, also told reporters the lender wasn’t handling the North Korean funds.
“We have not been involved in the kind of business you mention,” said Wang, general manager of the executive office.
China also promised to resolve the issue by transferring the funds to the Bank of China. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao told reporters the matter was difficult because of “technical and procedural issues we had not expected.”
Macau’s Monetary Authority and Banco Delta Asia officials have declined to explain the delay.
So as things begin to fall apart, the key point is that the U.S. is not being blamed. That may seem petty, but perception is important for what should follow, assuming the talks will eventually falter with North Korea reneging. If I’m wrong and the U.S. squanders the opportunity to put more pressure on North Korea afterwards, I’ll of course admit my error. But I think it’s too soon to judge that.
Update: I’ll add that it’s also premature to declare the 13 February deal or the Six-Part talks dead, yet, as negotiations leading to the 1994 Agreed Framework lasted for years, with no less that 16 major shifts. I believe it will indeed die, just that there is not conclusive evidence of that so far.
Update 2: Update: A look at news released later in the day has confirmed what I said earlier about the press blaming North Korea and not the U.S. Two of the more left leaning news outlets serve as examples. From NPR:
But Tuesday, the North Koreans refused to continue the talks until the money was actually transferred into a Chinese bank. China’s chief negotiator, Wu Dawei, said that the state-owned Bank of China had balked at accepting the transfer, and there was nothing the government could do about it.
Today, North Korea’s lead negotiator Kim Gye-gwan hopped on a plane back to Pyongyang, leaving the other diplomats to ponder where things went wrong.
[...]
Zhang Liangui, a North Korea expert at the Communist Party’s Central Party School in Beijing, says the current stalemate has just confirmed what he has thought all along: that Pyongyang is stalling for time while it builds up its nuclear arsenal.
And the Washington Post:
Delegates from Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital, had been refusing since Tuesday to take part in joint sessions until $25 million in frozen North Korean funds was transferred. Their departure followed repeated public assurances by Assistant Secretary of State Christopher R. Hill, the chief U.S. negotiator, that the funds issue would not derail the talks.
[...]
Although all six parties reaffirmed their commitment to agreements made so far, some officials conceded privately that the suspension of talks suggested North Korea might hold up future negotiations over other technical issues.
“The breakdown raises the question as to whether the North is really serious about denuclearization,” said Peter M. Beck, a Seoul-based analyst with the International Crisis Group. “It’s clearly not a question of if they’re getting their money back or how much of it.”
The WaPo comes closest to criticizing the Bush administration, Hills failed BDA prediction specifically, but also includes damning comments about North Korea’s disingenuous commitment to the process.
Again, so far there is no blaming of the Bush administration for failed talks.
March 22nd, 2007 at 11:01 am
It seems clear that North Korea’s tactic is and always has been to enter these types of negotiations, and then find some way to make the United States look like it is responsible for their failure. Amazingly, this tactic is working, especially in this climate of Bush-hating, where American politicians are willing to look past the facts and put the blame on Bush for North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. While I agree with you that this could be a great opportunity to turn the tables on North Korea, I think the latest deal was too vague to effectively do that. When it comes down to HEU, the North will be able to effectively claim that it was never part of the deal, and that it never had an HEU program anyways. Fueled by the reports (or at least erroneous headlines) that the U.S. may have been wrong about HEU, the North will once again succeed in making the U.S. look like the bad guys when the North backs out of this deal. The only question is how much the North will be able to blackmail out of us before they do.
March 22nd, 2007 at 11:21 am
Stewart,
What evidence do you have that the U.S. is being blamed for the current break in talks? The post above details the exact opposite of that assertion.
I highly doubt that North Korea will be able to (convincingly) claim the current deal (DOC) does not include a declaration on its known HEU escapades (it clearly does so, if implicitly – the deal isn’t as vague if you read the background documents referenced), and even South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) has publicly assessed that North Korea has some level of an HEU program, whether that be dormant or not.
Again, headlines so far are blaming North Korea for leaving the talks and putting the deadline in jeopardy, not the U.S.
March 22nd, 2007 at 11:41 am
My argument is not that the U.S. is currently being blamed, but that it has been effectively blamed in the past, and I believe this will play out again over the HEU issue. Do you really think that when this deal breaks down over HEU the Bush-haters are going to say that the Bush administration did its best? I predict that as soon as the Bush administration starts pushing hard on HEU, Russia, South Korea, and possibly China will tell the U.S. to back off, citing reports that we don’t know all that much about North Korean HEU. This will give the Dems all they need to say the Bush administration has reverted to its hawkish ways, and screwed up on diplomacy.
I think your “give them enough rope for strangulation” theory is a great one, I just don’t have faith that we are going to be able to pull it off.
March 22nd, 2007 at 12:11 pm
I completely agree that the U.S. has effectively been blamed in the past, in part due to inept perception management. Probably a good case could be made that the administration didn’t even play the perception management game, which has changed. Chris Hill has done a pretty much superhuman job of “engaging” North Korea, I think, and this has helped the U.S. image in the current snag.
The prime audience to convince on HEU, outside headlines, is the Democratic congress. How things unravel around HEU depends on how the pushing is done. So far, in this round of talks, Hill has been fairly deft. The trick here is not to convince the Democrats to accept what they would term as Bush’s hawkish and undiplomatic approach, but for them to suggest and support it themselves. Once there is some level of buy-in/ownership, probably the administration will go beyond what they would want to do, assuming it gets that far.
Again, it will depend on how the HEU issue is approached, or rather the perception of how it is approached.
March 23rd, 2007 at 12:33 am
I think the only effective way to get anywhere is for Japan to launch a nuclear defence program, that ends and reverses when the Kim Jong-Il regime and DPRK’s nuclear ambitions are gone. That is a language PRC and South Korea understand. Kim Jong Il would be out in matter of days.
However, politically it is probably an impossible move. Still, Japan should pursue that direction.
March 23rd, 2007 at 6:19 am
Yes, politically not a good idea, and probably none of the regional players would believe that Japan would give up nukes when Kim Jong-il did. Rather than ousting Kim it would more likely provoke an actual NE Asia nuclear and/or conventional arms race, one in which South Korea might surprise you with how fast they could field an impressive nuclear weapon. For proliferation and regional – or even global – security, that is a lose-lose situation that should be avoided.
March 23rd, 2007 at 10:30 am
You are probably right, but I find it a good thought experiment, because it points out what’s necessary for change - to motivate PRC (another debatable issue is whether the scenario you portray is lose-lose, it could lead to long-lasting peace by deterrence, like in Europe during the cold war. I pass on that one here). If PRC doesn’t change policy, all we can do is wait for time to weaken the power of the regime. For such an option, diplomacy’s primary purpose should be to win the information war - to make it harder for the regime to demonize its enemies at home..
I am sorry. I am getting off the line here. I am a debutant commenting here. I have been reading your blog for a while now, and I have to say it’s excellent, in fact, the best I’ve seen on the topic. Good references, lucid, well-founde analyses, and those banners you have - they speak more than a 1000 words.. I am grateful for your efforts.
March 23rd, 2007 at 12:20 pm
I listened to a report on NPR last night that leaned more toward putting the blame on DPRK than on the U.S. It even suggested that the U.S. should have taken a more hardline stance and not included the $25 million as part of the deal at all. Considering that NPR is more of a left-leaning source, that is good news.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9083541
The audio report is more detailed.
March 23rd, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Stewart,
I was equally surprised by the NPR report (see quotes from that article under “Update 2″ above). I’d say Hill’s work has made the difference with the media.
Fredrik,
I agree we need to do something to motivate China. Last year I tossed this into the ring for debate, but it’s probably very unrealistic due to our business interests there. Also, thanks for the kind words, appreciated very much.
March 23rd, 2007 at 5:19 pm
I have to give you this much: some of the chatter I’ve heard from the pro-engagement side sounds fairly despondent that the North Koreans are discrediting them and making Cheney’s view of the North look good. On the other hand, that same chatter suggests that Hill really does think he can negotiate North Korea into disarmament … although it may take several more years to actually agree on and implement everything, of course.
March 25th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
Hopefully the 60 day deadline and HEU hump will prevent this from getting into years, in which case it would worse than the half-asrsed strangulation we’ve seen.