Obama envoy warns N. Korea on nuke test, urges talks

[May 08, 2009]  SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- President Barack Obama's top envoy for North Korea warned of "consequences" if the regime pushes ahead with a threatened atomic test and urged Pyongyang to instead return to dialogue with Washington to defuse nuclear tensions.

Stephen Bosworth arrived in Seoul from Beijing just hours after North Korea accused the Obama administration of harboring a hostile policy toward Pyongyang, saying it would expand its nuclear arsenal in response.

"Nothing would be expected from the U.S., which remains unchanged in its hostility toward its dialogue partner," North Korea's Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried Friday by state media. The North "will bolster its nuclear deterrent as it has already clarified."

Bosworth urged North Korea -- which shocked the world by conducting a nuclear test in 2006 -- not to carry out another atomic test, as the communist regime has threatened to do in retaliation for U.N. sanctions its recent rocket launch.

"If the North Koreans decide to carry out a second nuclear test, we will deal with consequences of that. And there will be consequences," Bosworth told reporters, without elaborating.

"But we can't control at this stage what North Korea does. We certainly very much hope that they will not do a second nuclear test," he said.

However, Bosworth said Washington is ready and willing to hold direct talks with Pyongyang.

"We would not interpret our policy as being hostile ... President Obama has stressed on numerous occasions that the door to dialogue remains open," he told reporters after talks with Seoul's foreign minister. He said he hopes Pyongyang realizes "it is in their interest to continue dialogue and negotiation on a multilateral basis."

Former President George W. Bush once refused direct talks with North Korea -- a country that he termed as part of an "axis of evil" -- but agreed to allow an envoy engage in bilateral talks with North Koreans after Pyongyang conducted the nuclear test.

While campaigning for the presidency, Obama went further and said he would be willing to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il if it helps denuclearization. His administration has maintained support for the ongoing six-party nuclear negotiations, and Bosworth this week also offered direct talks between U.S. and North Korean envoys.

Analyst Paik Hak-soon at the Sejong Institute think tank said the North is trying to force Washington into higher-level direct talks in an attempt to reach a grand give-and-take deal. He said the regime appears to think the current envoy, Bosworth, is not senior enough.

"North Korea is applying maximum pressure on the United States to have bilateral talks in an attempt to restructure" the entire nuclear game, Paik said, adding that Pyongyang appears to be seeking a higher-level envoy with more dealmaking power than Bosworth.

Bosworth's trip to the region came as North Korea continued to ratchet up nuclear tensions following its controversial April 5 rocket launch.

Pyongyang characterized the launch as a successful bid to send a satellite into space. The U.S. and others saw it as a violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions barring the North from ballistic missile-related activity since the same technology can be used to fire an intercontinental missile mounted with nuclear arms.

The U.N. Security Council condemned the launch and punished the regime by slapping sanctions on three North Korean firms.

North Korea retaliated by quitting the nuclear negotiations, kicking out U.S. and U.N. inspectors and warning it may conduct nuclear or long-range missile tests if the U.N. and Washington refuse to apologize for the censure.

South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper recently reported "brisk" activity has been detected at North Korea's nuclear test site, citing an unnamed South Korean government source. The report could not be confirmed.

Pyongyang is believed to have enough plutonium to make at least a half-dozen atomic bombs but not the technology required to fit a nuclear warhead on a long-range missile.

The impoverished, isolated regime agreed in 2007 to begin dismantling its nuclear program in exchange for 1 million tons of fuel oil and other concessions. Disablement began later that year, with Pyongyang blowing up the cooling tower at its main nuclear facility in June 2008 in a dramatic show of its commitment to denuclearization.

But disablement came to a halt a month later as Pyongyang wrangled with Washington over how to verify its past atomic activities. The latest round of talks in December failed to push the process forward.

Bosworth and nuclear talks envoy Sung Kim had no set plans to visit Pyongyang during his regional tour, which also includes stops in Tokyo and Moscow, the State Department said.

[Associated Press; By JAE-SOON CHANG]

Associated Press writers Christopher Bodeen in Beijing and Pamela Hess in Washington contributed to this report.

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