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CNN Sunday Morning

China Hopes Tensions Over North Korea Will Be Resolved Peacefully

Aired December 29, 2002 - 09:02   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: China hopes tensions over North Korea's nuclear program can be calmed through talking. In a phone call, the foreign ministers of China and South Korea discussed the situation. We go now to Beijing, where our Lisa Rose Weaver is standing by live -- Lisa.
LISA ROSE WEAVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Renay, well, there was -- China offered no specific reaction to Pyongyang's announcement that it intends to expel monitors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, but China registered a lot of concern in the same report, in which it described that telephone conversation between the Chinese foreign minister and the South Korean minister. China again said that it's very concerned about the situation there on the Korean Peninsula.

Now, other than very briefly describing that phone conversation, China's main stance throughout this is that the United States, North Korea, and South Korea have to restart a dialogue to diffuse the situation there. The way that China hopes that they do so is through the 1994 agreement then -- under which the North Korea would have frozen its nuclear weapons program in exchange for fuel oil from the United States.

Now, of course, the oil was cut. There is no dialogue going on now between the United States and North Korea. And that, in China's reaction, seems to be what concerns Chinese officials most, as opposed to details about what China itself will do. That's not entirely clear.

China is under a lot of diplomatic pressure at the moment from the United States to use its influence over North Korea to try to get the North Koreans to come into line, if you will, and we can only expect that that kind of pressure will be continuing -- Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: Lisa, talk a little bit more about those pressures here. I know that North Korea gets most of its fuel and about half of its food from China. China's seen as the patron state here. But China also wants to increase its own diplomatic ties with the West for its own economy. Talk to us about the specific kind of pressures that Beijing faces.

WEAVER: Well, it faces pressures on a few different levels. On the one hand, it has a long-standing ideological relationship, dating back decades with North Korea. I mean, at one point, China and North Korea fought side by side against U.S. troops in the early '50s during the Korean War. Now, of course, China's priorities have changed a lot since then. China remains one of the few places that North Korean leaders come to visit, however, and that's one of the reasons that other countries are hoping China will be able to bring some pressure to bear on the North.

Other pressures include things like the refugee crisis. There are anywhere up to 250,000, some people say closer to 400,000, North Korean refugees living on the Chinese side of the border. China has been put into kind of a diplomatic bind in the past year as a small but steady stream of those refugees come to Beijing seeking asylum in embassies, in foreign embassies in a bid to go to a third country and ultimately go to South Korea.

Now, China is bound by treaty with Pyongyang to treat these people as economic migrants and to return them to North Korea, which it reportedly has done. But in cases where there's been a lot of media coverage of the asylum bid of individuals in Beijing, China has been rather hard pressed to turn them back and, in fact, has facilitated their exit from China and then ultimately on to North Korea. Just one example of the diplomatic pressures China finds itself under now -- Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: Indeed, Lisa Rose Weaver, standing by live in Beijing. Thank you very much for the report.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




Peacefully>


Aired December 29, 2002 - 09:02   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: China hopes tensions over North Korea's nuclear program can be calmed through talking. In a phone call, the foreign ministers of China and South Korea discussed the situation. We go now to Beijing, where our Lisa Rose Weaver is standing by live -- Lisa.
LISA ROSE WEAVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Renay, well, there was -- China offered no specific reaction to Pyongyang's announcement that it intends to expel monitors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, but China registered a lot of concern in the same report, in which it described that telephone conversation between the Chinese foreign minister and the South Korean minister. China again said that it's very concerned about the situation there on the Korean Peninsula.

Now, other than very briefly describing that phone conversation, China's main stance throughout this is that the United States, North Korea, and South Korea have to restart a dialogue to diffuse the situation there. The way that China hopes that they do so is through the 1994 agreement then -- under which the North Korea would have frozen its nuclear weapons program in exchange for fuel oil from the United States.

Now, of course, the oil was cut. There is no dialogue going on now between the United States and North Korea. And that, in China's reaction, seems to be what concerns Chinese officials most, as opposed to details about what China itself will do. That's not entirely clear.

China is under a lot of diplomatic pressure at the moment from the United States to use its influence over North Korea to try to get the North Koreans to come into line, if you will, and we can only expect that that kind of pressure will be continuing -- Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: Lisa, talk a little bit more about those pressures here. I know that North Korea gets most of its fuel and about half of its food from China. China's seen as the patron state here. But China also wants to increase its own diplomatic ties with the West for its own economy. Talk to us about the specific kind of pressures that Beijing faces.

WEAVER: Well, it faces pressures on a few different levels. On the one hand, it has a long-standing ideological relationship, dating back decades with North Korea. I mean, at one point, China and North Korea fought side by side against U.S. troops in the early '50s during the Korean War. Now, of course, China's priorities have changed a lot since then. China remains one of the few places that North Korean leaders come to visit, however, and that's one of the reasons that other countries are hoping China will be able to bring some pressure to bear on the North.

Other pressures include things like the refugee crisis. There are anywhere up to 250,000, some people say closer to 400,000, North Korean refugees living on the Chinese side of the border. China has been put into kind of a diplomatic bind in the past year as a small but steady stream of those refugees come to Beijing seeking asylum in embassies, in foreign embassies in a bid to go to a third country and ultimately go to South Korea.

Now, China is bound by treaty with Pyongyang to treat these people as economic migrants and to return them to North Korea, which it reportedly has done. But in cases where there's been a lot of media coverage of the asylum bid of individuals in Beijing, China has been rather hard pressed to turn them back and, in fact, has facilitated their exit from China and then ultimately on to North Korea. Just one example of the diplomatic pressures China finds itself under now -- Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: Indeed, Lisa Rose Weaver, standing by live in Beijing. Thank you very much for the report.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




Peacefully>