The Guardian, London
North Korea's unexpected pledge this week to abandon its nuclear weapons appears to be the result of a highly unusual diplomatic pincer movement by the US and China. The maneuver has potentially positive implications for resolving the nuclear stalemate with another so-called axis of evil state, Iran.
The deal forged at the six-party talks hosted by China in Beijing remains highly fragile, as Tuesday's renewed demands from Pyongyang show. But if made to stick, diplomats believe that it may come to be seen as a landmark in Sino-US strategic security cooperation and a paradigm for ending the West's dispute with Tehran.
After two years of fruitless talks, the turning point seems to have come not in Beijing but in New York, at a meeting last week at the UN between US President George W. Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao (
The US president is said to have warned that in the absence of progress, the US may step up pressure on North Korea's inherently unstable regime -- with unpredictable consequences.
"If the talks had failed again, it would have harmed China's credibility," said a diplomat familiar with the talks.
But China had more powerful motives too. As its international standing has grown, its broader interests in solving the dispute have increasingly fallen into line with Washington's.
"China has its own security and economic concerns. It sees North Korea as a destabilizing factor in the region. It wants to keep it as a buffer state. It doesn't want the Korean Peninsula to be nuclearized or destroyed," the diplomat said.
Beijing also feared Pyongyang's nuclear arms could lead its regional rival, Japan, and South Korea to acquire similar weapons while encouraging a heightened US military presence.
The US decision to offer security guarantees, aid and technology to North Korea, having long refused to do so, also reflects a more consensual perspective in Washington. That change is attributed in part to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's appointment and also to the reassignment to the UN of John Bolton, the former arms control chief whose abrasive style antagonized Pyongyang.
But preoccupations with Iraq, growing worries about Iran, plus Japanese and South Korean concerns about escalation have also helped persuade the White House that China's insistence on engagement, rather than confrontation, may best serve its interests. The US eschewed bilateral contacts after the 2002 rupture that led North Korea to quit the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Now its chief negotiator, Christopher Hill,hailing the deal as a "turning point," may visit Pyongyang.
The contradictions between this new US approach and its policy towards Iran may become increasingly difficult to justify internationally. Mohamed ElBaradei, the UN nuclear agency chief, made the comparison this week while warning against American "brinkmanship." Iranian officials say privately that Washington's refusal to meet bilaterally, indirect threats of military coercion and economic sanctions all hinder progress on the nuclear issue.
Beijing seems to agree. With its UN veto in its pocket, it has opposed punitive measures against Iran, an important oil and gas exporter, while insisting engagement is the best path forward.
Ironically, it may be China, Washington's new-found "strategic partner" in the east, which also holds the key to the West's Iranian impasse.
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
I have heard people equate the government’s stance on resisting forced unification with China or the conditional reinstatement of the military court system with the rise of the Nazis before World War II. The comparison is absurd. There is no meaningful parallel between the government and Nazi Germany, nor does such a mindset exist within the general public in Taiwan. It is important to remember that the German public bore some responsibility for the horrors of the Holocaust. Post-World War II Germany’s transitional justice efforts were rooted in a national reckoning and introspection. Many Jews were sent to concentration camps not
RSS