hankyoreh

By Lee Je-hoon

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il reportedly arrived at Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, and inspected its industrial facilities on Saturday, the third day of his visit to China. It appeared that Kim’s personal train left Harbin, heading for home through the city of Tumen in China’s Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture.

Despite Kim’s visit to China, experts speculate that no major changes in the currently tense situation on the Korean Peninsula, with North Korea and China facing off against South Korea, the United States and Japan will occur. Most government officials and experts say the current situation will neither improve nor worsen.

However, experts predict ome short term reactions as a result of Kim’s visit to China.

First, a South Korean official said Sunday that the U.S. government will announce plans for additional sanctions on North Korea early this week. Experts say the additional sanctions will not result in any long-term impact, but will still result in controversy from North Korea’s expected objections.

Second, early next month, both China and South Korea and the United States, respectively, will hold a series of naval exercises in the West Sea.

Third, the Chinese Defense Ministry announced today that the Chinese Navy’s North Sea Fleet would conduct live-fire exercises in the waters southeast of Qingdao September 1 through 4.

Finally, on Aug. 18, South Korea and the United States announced they would hold allied anti-submarine drills in the West Sea in early September.

The upcoming Workers Party of Korea (WPK) meeting of party representatives, scheduled to be held in early September, is also a major variable that will seriously impact the situation on the Korean Peninsula. The event is of such significance that the South Korean and U.S. governments have said they will watch the event carefully. If North Korea uses the convention to announce a new policy of openness to the outside, such a policy would result in a positive impact on North Korean and South Korean relations. However, the general expectation of such a policy change is low.

A government official said, “The party conventions have typically focused on North Korea’s internal cohesion.”

These predictions, however, do not have to be interpreted in an entirely negative manner.

A former high-ranking security and diplomacy figure said, “It is very possible that after the November mid-term elections, the United States will begin to move toward negotiations and a compromise will be reached between Washington and Beijing.”

An article published through the online edition of the New York Times on Friday quoted the U.S. government stating that it had concluded that pressure alone would not be enough to move North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-il. The U.S. government also reportedly has begun weighing a fresh effort at engagement with Kim’s government.

The Chinese government, also, has begun negotiations with both North Korea, South Korea, the United States, Japan and Russia, including the dispatch of Wu Dawei, China's special representative for Korean Peninsula affairs. Observers believe this to be an opening move to first stabilize the situation and next month will open the gates on discussions in the UN General Assembly to restart the six-party talks.

A South Korean government official, however, did not think the talks would resume anytime soon, explaining the essence of the situation on the peninsula has not changed, and therefore even if talks were held, results may be poor.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]