Sanctions Against North

WASHINGTON -- The United States moved yesterday to try to impose United Nations sanctions on North Korea for its defiance of international nuclear safeguards."

TOKYO --Questions over the effectiveness of the Security Council's punitive sanctions against North Korea for its claimed nuclear test grew yesterday, as both South Korea and China - the North's two most important trading partners - indicated that business and economic relations would largely be unaffected. A day after the council unanimously passed the resolution after nearly a week of intensive diplomatic negotiations, the South Korean government said it would still pursue economic projects with North Korea, including an industrial zone and tourist resort in the North.

SEATTLE -- U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher, in a conciliatory move keyed to the opening of foreign ministers' meetings at the Pacific Rim summit, said yesterday that the United States is committed to a "diplomatic solution" to the North Korean nuclear standoff and is not yet ready to seek international economic sanctions against North Korea.Mr. Christopher's statement means the administration is putting off for at least a few weeks carrying out its threats to seek tough U.N. Security Council action against North Korea if it fails to open its nuclear facilities to international inspection.

UNITED NATIONS -- The United States introduced a draft U.N. resolution yesterday seeking tough sanctions against North Korea in the wake of its announced nuclear test, pushing for a vote today, but Russia and China balked at two key measures and say they want more time. The resolution calls for an arms embargo, a ban on goods related to North Korea's missile and nuclear programs, and a freeze on financial activities that support them, as well as a travel ban for senior North Korean officials.

President Bush doesn't talk about the "axis of evil" anymore, though its members, Iran, Iraq and North Korea, remain a preoccupation of the administration, and pose significant concern for the Group of Eight nations meeting tomorrow in St. Petersburg, Russia. Let's start with Iran, which this week refused to commit to a package of incentives to give up its nuclear ambitions - a proposal significant for its offer to assist Tehran with a civilian nuclear program and the Bush administration's agreement to join any talks about it. At the same time, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reiterated with his usual flourish his country's insistence that it will not relent on its nuclear rights.

VIENNA, Austria -- North Korea sidestepped the threat of impending U.N. economic sanctions yesterday by agreeing, after months of delay, to allow international inspections of seven nuclear facilities.The International Atomic Energy Agency announced that the Pyongyang regime of President Kim Il-Sung had accepted the agency's plans and conditions for inspecting the facilities. The inspections are expected to take place within a few weeks.Though other issues remain unresolved, both the IAEA and the Clinton administration portrayed the new agreement as an important step forward.

WASHINGTON -- Regardless of how many times North Korea tests its missiles, it does not constitute an existential threat to the United States or its allies. In fact, some of the suggestions for a response to the missile tests that have significantly increased international tensions are more dangerous than the specter of a North Korean missile capability itself. The missile tests compound North Korea's continual effort to process plutonium for nuclear weapons, and the prospect of Pyongyang having not only nuclear weapons but also the means to deliver them at considerable distances has generated alarm in the United States and East Asia.

UNITED NATIONS -- The United States introduced a draft U.N. resolution yesterday seeking tough sanctions against North Korea in the wake of its announced nuclear test, pushing for a vote today, but Russia and China balked at two key measures and say they want more time. The resolution calls for an arms embargo, a ban on goods related to North Korea's missile and nuclear programs, and a freeze on financial activities that support them, as well as a travel ban for senior North Korean officials.

WASHINGTON -- The United States and North Korea have reached broad agreement on international inspections of all officially disclosed North Korean nuclear sites, and could put the finishing touches on a deal by the end of the week, a senior State Department official says.If in fact the North Koreans have agreed to unrestricted access for the nuclear inspectors to all its official nuclear sites, President Clinton will be able to claim one of the most significant foreign policy victories of his presidency.

MOSCOW -- Russia's refusal yesterday to support an American plan to phase in sanctions against North Korea has as much to do with local politics as it does with the actual question of nuclear proliferation.Foreign Minister Andrei V. Kozyrev angrily accused the United States of breaking an agreement to consult with Russia before making any such proposals -- but it was clear that the government was more concerned with its own image at home than with the substance of the plan.Moscow has no desire to see its former North Korean ally produce nuclear weapons, but it is also being increasingly careful not to appear to be following Washington's lead on important foreign policy issues.

WASHINGTON -- The U.N. Security Council moved quickly yesterday toward imposing new economic sanctions against North Korea amid a firestorm of international protest ignited by Pyongyang's claim that it had detonated a nuclear bomb in an underground test. The Security Council voted unanimously to condemn North Korea's action. Diplomats were weighing a draft proposal submitted by the United States that would bar the sale of military or luxury goods to North Korea and require the inspection of all cargo shipped into and out of the country, among other steps.

President Bush doesn't talk about the "axis of evil" anymore, though its members, Iran, Iraq and North Korea, remain a preoccupation of the administration, and pose significant concern for the Group of Eight nations meeting tomorrow in St. Petersburg, Russia. Let's start with Iran, which this week refused to commit to a package of incentives to give up its nuclear ambitions - a proposal significant for its offer to assist Tehran with a civilian nuclear program and the Bush administration's agreement to join any talks about it. At the same time, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reiterated with his usual flourish his country's insistence that it will not relent on its nuclear rights.

WASHINGTON -- Regardless of how many times North Korea tests its missiles, it does not constitute an existential threat to the United States or its allies. In fact, some of the suggestions for a response to the missile tests that have significantly increased international tensions are more dangerous than the specter of a North Korean missile capability itself. The missile tests compound North Korea's continual effort to process plutonium for nuclear weapons, and the prospect of Pyongyang having not only nuclear weapons but also the means to deliver them at considerable distances has generated alarm in the United States and East Asia.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration warned North Korea for the first time yesterday that if it conducts a nuclear test, the United States and several Pacific powers would take punitive action, but officials stopped short of saying what kind of sanctions would result. "Action would have to be taken," Stephen J. Hadley, President Bush's national security adviser, said on CNN's Late Edition. Asked earlier on Fox News Sunday about recent reports that intelligence agencies had warned that North Korea could conduct its first test, Hadley added: "We've seen some evidence that says that they may be preparing for a nuclear test.

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia - A top Russian diplomat said yesterday that a nuclear North Korea would be against Russia's national interests and that the Kremlin would re-evaluate its opposition to international sanctions should the North Koreans develop nuclear weapons. The statements by Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov, who was the Kremlin's emissary to North Korea during a diplomatic mission in January, amounted to a warning to North Korea that patience was ebbing in one of the few nations that has offered it sympathy during a five-month nuclear crisis with the United States.

WASHINGTON -- With his sudden agreement to the first North-South summit, North Korean President Kim Il Sung has expanded his chances of wringing concessions from the West in return for ultimately abandoning a nuclear arsenal.The proposal for a meeting between North and South Korean presidents, the first since the peninsula was divided in 1945, was widely hailed in South Korea as a breakthrough in the nuclear standoff.North Korean President Kim Il Sung proposed the summit through former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who returned to Seoul yesterday after an unofficial diplomatic mission to North Korea and will brief White House officials in Washington this morning.

WASHINGTON -- President Clinton stepped up efforts yesterday to increase diplomatic pressure on North Korea by calling it "virtually imperative" that the world community impose economic sanctions on Asia's nuclear renegade.With British Prime Minister John Major by his side during a D-Day appearance in Portsmouth, England, Mr. Clinton sought to quell talk of armed conflict, saying sanctions were "clearly . . . not an act of war and should not be seen as such."But North Korea's ambassador in Beijing, Chu Chang Jun, repeated warnings yesterday that "any kind of economic sanctions" against North Korea would be regarded as "a declaration of war."

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration warned North Korea for the first time yesterday that if it conducts a nuclear test, the United States and several Pacific powers would take punitive action, but officials stopped short of saying what kind of sanctions would result. "Action would have to be taken," Stephen J. Hadley, President Bush's national security adviser, said on CNN's Late Edition. Asked earlier on Fox News Sunday about recent reports that intelligence agencies had warned that North Korea could conduct its first test, Hadley added: "We've seen some evidence that says that they may be preparing for a nuclear test.

WASHINGTON -- President Clinton, reacting to signs that North Korea might be retreating from confrontation yesterday, said that the United States would reopen talks if Pyongyang was prepared to "freeze" its nuclear program and accept international safeguards."

MOSCOW -- Russia's refusal yesterday to support an American plan to phase in sanctions against North Korea has as much to do with local politics as it does with the actual question of nuclear proliferation.Foreign Minister Andrei V. Kozyrev angrily accused the United States of breaking an agreement to consult with Russia before making any such proposals -- but it was clear that the government was more concerned with its own image at home than with the substance of the plan.Moscow has no desire to see its former North Korean ally produce nuclear weapons, but it is also being increasingly careful not to appear to be following Washington's lead on important foreign policy issues.