青岛小姐上们服务电话:Dear Leader plays it sma...

Dear Leader plays it smart
By Yong Kwon

Leaders of the two Koreas returned to their respective capitals this week with deals worth billions of dollars and potentially guaranteeing energy security for the two natural resource-deprived states.

South Korea's President Lee Myung-bak concluded a US$4.1 billion deal to develop the Surgil gas fields in Uzbekistan and made headway in developing ties with Kazakhstan and Mongolia. Kim Jong-il returned to North Korea from the Russian Federation with tentative plans to build a trans-Korean pipeline that would deliver Russian natural gas to the Korean Peninsula.

While the economic ramifications of the deals are significant, Lee and Kim's forays were also motivated by more traditional political objectives. The presence of a permanent pipeline delivering fuel to the North (if not, the steady stream of rent for delivery of natural gas on to the South) would lessen the impact of the sanctions regime imposed by the international community. At the same time, attracting diplomatic attention over nuclear arms control and energy helps Pyongyang deepen valuable diplomatic contacts.

For Seoul, finding a reliable source of energy represents a highly crucial task as its economic prowess lends both political and diplomatic standing for South Korea in the international community. Its standing plays a crucial role in South Korea's ability to leverage diplomatic pressure on Pyongyang. At the end of the day, any diplomatic gesture by either Korea is tantamount to bolstering national security and extending the regimes' claim over the peninsula.

Both Seoul and Pyongyang have consistently used diplomacy to forward territorial claims or economically sabotage each other. In 1973, the UN General Assembly dissolved the UNCURK (United Nations Commission for the Unification and Rehabilitation of Korea) after North Korea won endorsements for the motion from newly independent African states. [1]

Around the same time, after recognizing the danger of the North acceding to the United Nations as the sole legitimate political entity on the peninsula, the South disavowed the Hallstein Doctrine and began seeking diplomatic relations with states regardless of their relationship with North Korea. [2] Alongside seeking new ties abroad, Seoul also jealously guarded traditional contacts such as Japan, pressuring Tokyo to limit its loans to Pyongyang.

It is particularly interesting to note that these diplomatic maneuvers occurred while the two Koreas were discussing basic groundwork for unification. Therefore, it is difficult to assume the intentions of either state by simply observing their outward aggression towards one another.

North Korea no doubt had ulterior motives in reaching out to the Russian Federation. In addition to taking advantage of Russia's desires to play a larger role in Northeast Asia for food assistance (See Pyongyang plays on Moscow's desire, Asia Times Online, August 12, 2011), many observers suggest that Pyongyang may be seeking to modernize its air force by acquiring Russian jets. [3]

Korean People's Air Force chief Li Byeongcheol accompanied Kim Jong-il on his visit to Ulan Ude and while the details of his role in the negotiations are unclear, North Korea's MiG-29s are two decades behind South Korea's F-15Ks and present a serious challenge to the North's defense.

Kim Jong-il is playing a clever game. The Russian Federation alone is capable of providing significant economic and diplomatic support, but by offering to discuss nuclear nonproliferation, Pyongyang is inviting other ambitious powers to the table. India, drawn in by the potential of diminishing North Korea's ties with Myanmar and Pakistan, is due to dispatch a delegation to Pyongyang in September. [4]

By attracting international attention and providing non-binding promises, North Korea protects itself from any unanimous action by the international community to force its nuclear program to an end.

The widespread assumption among policymakers is that North Korea is inherently isolationist. However, Juche ideology is more concerned about upholding economic sovereignty than creating economic autarky and if one considers the great feats accomplished by the North Koreans during the Cold War, it is very evident that Pyongyang too has a foreign policy conception stretching across the world.

From the very beginning, North Korea was dealt a losing hand in the race for sole claim over the entire Korean nation. On June 25, 1948 (exactly two years before the start of the Korean War), the Temporary Commission established by the UN to observe elections on the Korean Peninsula reported that the election in South Korea was not only a "valid expression of the free will" of the Korean people, but also "constituted approximately two-thirds of the people of all Korea." [5]

In addition, the passing of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 84 on July 7, 1950, which sanctioned the UN-led military action on behalf of the Republic of Korea, upheld the legitimacy of Syngman Rhee's government in Seoul over that of Kim Il-Sung in Pyongyang.

Despite being rejected by the international community and recognized by a mere handful of Soviet satellite states, Pyongyang rejected Moscow's recommendation in 1956 to gain joint membership in the United Nations alongside Seoul, revealing its intention to be recognized as the sole legitimate regime on the Korean Peninsula. [6] Following this explicit declaration, North Korea actively engaged the Third World Movement and by 1973, had even established diplomatic relations with Sweden, Norway and Denmark.

By 1978, North Korea had managed to gain recognition from 93 states, closing the gap with the South, which at the time maintained relations with 104 states. In this context, the very fact that both Koreas jointly acceded to the United Nations in 1991 reveals Pyongyang's incredible diplomatic capacity.

While the collapse of the communist bloc and degeneration of North Korea as a nuclear rogue state severely damaged Pyongyang's place in the world, navigating international relations as a pariah state is not a new experience for the regime. Continuous exploitation of ties with other outcast nations such as Syria, Iran, Yemen and Myanmar provided an outlet for the regime.

As recently as this spring, and despite increasing US pressure to stop their cooperation, Pyongyang provided Tehran with highly specialized computer programs that would facilitate nuclear weapons development. [7] The ineffective sanctions regime will be further weakened by the downpayments that governments will pay to negotiate with Pyongyang.

Across the demilitarized zone, Seoul has not yet made any moves to change the basic policy of upholding an all-or-nothing "Grand Bargain". While making nods towards cooperating in the construction of a trans-Korean pipeline, South Korea's demands for a formal apology for the double attacks in 2010 will stand in the way of making any breakthroughs.

In addition, regardless of the results of the hinted meetings Pyongyang regarding the pipelines in November, it is unlikely that Seoul will allow the pipelines to become a source of leverage for the North. Also, South Korea's show of military prowess by hosting joint exercises with the United States will not deter the North from making more daring attacks along the Northern Limitation Line as the US Seventh Fleet stays away from contested waters in the Yellow Sea.

The negotiations in Russia and the coming meeting with the Indian representatives are tests for North Korean foreign policymakers in more broadly engaging with the world as they did in the 1970s. Pyongyang's objectives have remained consistent; to maintain parity against US-South Korea military and diplomatic pressures by whatever means necessary.

While recent negotiations are good avenues to contain the level of violence, they must be accompanied by substantive and honest promises and guarantees. No change to the tenuous state of peace marred by contained violence on the Korean Peninsula will be forthcoming unless fundamental shifts occur in conditions and the way in which the international community deals with North Korea.