Will North Korea give up the bomb?

The necessary steps to be taken by both the US and N Korea

The recent Kim-Trump meeting at the demilitarised zone has increased the prospects for the resumption of stalled nuclear talks between the two sides later this year. However, this time the US has to put in some work before any renewal of nuclear talks so as not to replicate the shortcomings of the previous negotiations which led to a vague commitment on the part of North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons without any substantive agreement in place. And this time, the US also needs to fill the loopholes that had been the cause of the violation of agreements made earlier between North Korea and the successive US administrations in the years 1994 and 2005, respectively.

There is no denying the fact that the US has provided security assurances to North Korea in the past and is ready to once again extend security assurances if it agrees to end its nuclear programme. If history is any teacher, it tells us that the security assurances in the past have rather played a negligible role in halting North Korea’s nuclear programme. Had these security assurances been credible, the outcome would have surely been a positive one.

It was in the year 2005 that the two sides agreed to the ‘Statement of Principles’ with the US providing North Korea with security assurances that it harbours no intention of attacking North with nuclear as well as conventional weapons. However, this was followed by North Korea’s first nuclear weapons tests as well as a long-range ballistic missile test.

The reason being the fact that these assurances have little credibility unless they are supplemented by complete normalisation of diplomatic and economic relations. That is to say, the success of these assurances is dependent upon the political relations between the sender and the receiver. Hence, the prerequisite is normalisation of ties with North Korea prior to making any efforts at assuring it that the US harbours no aggressive intentions against it.

As of late, the US Senate has approved a new round of economic sanctions targeting North Korea with a particular focus on the secondary sanctions which have the sole purpose of strengthening the primary ones. Moreover, although the summit diplomacy between the two sides and President Donald Trump’s symbolic gesture of setting foot on the North Korean soil are steps forward towards the improvement of bilateral relations but formal diplomatic relations between the two sides is an existing deficit. It was in the beginning of the year that Kim Jong-Un and President Donald Trump vowed to open liaison offices in each other’s territory but this idea also seems to have been held in abeyance now. In order to materialise the plan, the US will also have to make substantive efforts towards achieving an Inter-Korean reconciliation. This will also ultimately end the need for the maintenance of extended security guarantee covering South Korea and would increase the credibility of any of the security guarantees provided to North Korea in the future.

Further, given the fact that the North Korean regime attaches immense significance to its nuclear weapons programme in its pursuit for prolonging regime survival, the US also needs to assure North Korea that it does not seek regime change.

All in all, the aforementioned pre-requisites if fulfilled will ultimately increase the regime’s incentive to deprive itself of a security blanket and above all a bargaining chip. The recent behaviour exhibited by North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un is also a testimony of North Korea’s readiness to cooperate with the International community but it appears to be in need of something more comprehensive and credible now.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 7^th, 2019.

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