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CNN Saturday Morning News
Administration Wants North Korea to Disarm
Aired October 19, 2002 - 08:07 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.
KATHLEEN KENNEDY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We turn now to the White House concern over North Korea's new nuclear arms program. Today, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly is calling on North Korea to disarm or face massive international pressure.
With more on this, we're joined by our White House correspondent, Suzanne Malveaux, in Washington -- hi, Suzanne.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi.
The Bush administration is really stressing that diplomacy and international pressure, they believe, will force North Korea to comply with a 1994 agreement to disarm. As you mentioned before, Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly is delivering that message overseas. He was first in Beijing. He is now on to Seoul, South Korea. That is where he held a press conference this morning, making the administration's case.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES KELLY, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE: We are watching very closely to see if North Korea takes the action we and the rest of the international community are demanding, to immediately and visibly end its nuclear weapons program and to abide by its international commitments.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: There are really a number of options that the Bush administration is entertaining. One of them is looking at the economics of all of this, perhaps cutting fuel assistance to North Korea, to non-humanitarian needs in the short-term, also putting a great deal of pressure on other governments to do the same, major trading partners. President Bush is going to be meeting with the president of China, Jiang Zemin, on Friday at his Crawford ranch and then later next weekend he's going to be meeting with the leaders of Japan and South Korea at the economic summit in Mexico to make the United States' case.
Now, as you know, Kathleen, really terror is on the mind of many, and, of course, the Bush administration very concerned about the latest string of terrorist attacks overseas. But the terrorist alert here has remained the same. U.S. officials saying there is no evidence that a terrorist attack here on U.S. soil is imminent. The president is expected to tape a message to Australians, many Australians, who were victims of the latest terrorist attack in Bali -- Kathleen. KENNEDY: And just a question for you. A lot of people have had sort of questions about the timing of this disclosure from North Korea. What has the White House had to say about that and the speculation of ulterior motives?
MALVEAUX: Well, certainly there's a debate going on in terms of what did that actually mean? Was it meant to fiord some of the dialogue and some of the progress that has been made with North Korean officials? That is one theory. The other, of course, is that it's really trying to prove that hey, you know, it's thumbing its nose, saying that we're a strong power, we're a nuclear power. And a lot of signs that the United States, of course, looking to Iraq and possibly going to war with Iraq, that North Korea taking a rather belligerent stand, some U.S. officials say.
But most of them think that this could be an opening for dialogue and really a lot of international pressure being put on North Korea to disarm. They believe that this is actually going to work very much -- unlike dealing with Saddam Hussein and Iraq -- they believe that diplomacy and particularly the economic pressure is really going to get them to disarm and change this around.
KENNEDY: And is this likely to affect U.S. efforts to disarm Iraq?
MALVEAUX: Well, you know, one debate that's happening is that they're saying that this war on terror is really too spread out, that you're looking at al Qaeda all over the place, you're looking at Saddam Hussein in Iraq and now this is perhaps, really, at the worst possible time as it could come for the administration, now looking at North Korea as a nuclear power in and of itself.
So there are those who argue that really they do not want this to be a distraction from the message, the message being that the administration has holding Saddam Hussein to account to disarm his own country.
KENNEDY: All right, we'll leave it there.
Suzanne Malveaux in Washington, thanks a lot.
MALVEAUX: Thanks, Kathleen.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired October 19, 2002 - 08:07 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KATHLEEN KENNEDY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We turn now to the White House concern over North Korea's new nuclear arms program. Today, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly is calling on North Korea to disarm or face massive international pressure.
With more on this, we're joined by our White House correspondent, Suzanne Malveaux, in Washington -- hi, Suzanne.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi.
The Bush administration is really stressing that diplomacy and international pressure, they believe, will force North Korea to comply with a 1994 agreement to disarm. As you mentioned before, Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly is delivering that message overseas. He was first in Beijing. He is now on to Seoul, South Korea. That is where he held a press conference this morning, making the administration's case.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES KELLY, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE: We are watching very closely to see if North Korea takes the action we and the rest of the international community are demanding, to immediately and visibly end its nuclear weapons program and to abide by its international commitments.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: There are really a number of options that the Bush administration is entertaining. One of them is looking at the economics of all of this, perhaps cutting fuel assistance to North Korea, to non-humanitarian needs in the short-term, also putting a great deal of pressure on other governments to do the same, major trading partners. President Bush is going to be meeting with the president of China, Jiang Zemin, on Friday at his Crawford ranch and then later next weekend he's going to be meeting with the leaders of Japan and South Korea at the economic summit in Mexico to make the United States' case.
Now, as you know, Kathleen, really terror is on the mind of many, and, of course, the Bush administration very concerned about the latest string of terrorist attacks overseas. But the terrorist alert here has remained the same. U.S. officials saying there is no evidence that a terrorist attack here on U.S. soil is imminent. The president is expected to tape a message to Australians, many Australians, who were victims of the latest terrorist attack in Bali -- Kathleen. KENNEDY: And just a question for you. A lot of people have had sort of questions about the timing of this disclosure from North Korea. What has the White House had to say about that and the speculation of ulterior motives?
MALVEAUX: Well, certainly there's a debate going on in terms of what did that actually mean? Was it meant to fiord some of the dialogue and some of the progress that has been made with North Korean officials? That is one theory. The other, of course, is that it's really trying to prove that hey, you know, it's thumbing its nose, saying that we're a strong power, we're a nuclear power. And a lot of signs that the United States, of course, looking to Iraq and possibly going to war with Iraq, that North Korea taking a rather belligerent stand, some U.S. officials say.
But most of them think that this could be an opening for dialogue and really a lot of international pressure being put on North Korea to disarm. They believe that this is actually going to work very much -- unlike dealing with Saddam Hussein and Iraq -- they believe that diplomacy and particularly the economic pressure is really going to get them to disarm and change this around.
KENNEDY: And is this likely to affect U.S. efforts to disarm Iraq?
MALVEAUX: Well, you know, one debate that's happening is that they're saying that this war on terror is really too spread out, that you're looking at al Qaeda all over the place, you're looking at Saddam Hussein in Iraq and now this is perhaps, really, at the worst possible time as it could come for the administration, now looking at North Korea as a nuclear power in and of itself.
So there are those who argue that really they do not want this to be a distraction from the message, the message being that the administration has holding Saddam Hussein to account to disarm his own country.
KENNEDY: All right, we'll leave it there.
Suzanne Malveaux in Washington, thanks a lot.
MALVEAUX: Thanks, Kathleen.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
