Posted on 10/16/2002 4:42:48 PM PDT by Brytani
Breaking News on Fox
Fox has just confirmed North Korea has admitted to the United States that they have a secret nuclear weapons program. This breaks a treaty signed with the Clinton Administration, in exchange for N. Korea not having nuclear weapons, the US agreed to build non-lethal nuclear plants for them.
Once again, Clinton's treaties turn out to be worth as much as his word.
"All communications with the Carters must be by letter."
The Carter Center
One Copenhill
453 Freedom Parkway
Atlanta, GA 30307
And about time. Isn't it wonderful to have adults like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and yes, Powell et. al. doing the planning, and a President like Bush who's wise enough to initiate and take their counsel and run with it? It feels soooooo good to see some proactive 'real world' moves for once!
Agreements all around on that one.
JUNE 9, 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang and Audrey Yu attend state dinner for President Kim Dae Jung of South Korea.
JUNE 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang donates $50,000 to the Democratic National Committee and $50,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
JULY 12, 1998 : (N. KOREAN FROGMAN FOUND DEAD) One North Korean frogman found dead on a beach at Donghae on South Korea's east coast. http://asia.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/06/29/korea.navy.timeline.reut/
JULY 14, 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang attends White House movie nightwith President Clinton.
JUNE 22, 1998 : (NORTH KOREA COMMANDOES CAUGHT BY SOUTH KOREA) Nine North Korean commandos found dead aboard a mini-sub caught in fishing nets, off Sokcho on the east coat of South Korea. http://asia.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/06/29/korea.navy.timeline.reut/
SUMMER 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Terry McAuliffe, President Clinton's friend and chief fund-raiser, signs a one-year contract to work for Mr. Chang as a consultant.
SEPT. 18, 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang gives $50,000 to the Democratic National Committee.
SEPT. 20, 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang meets in New York with Col. Jack Pritchard, a National Security Council senior ofcial for Asian affairs, to discuss policy ideas related to North Korea.
NOV. 1998 (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang has pizza with President Clinton at Hyatt hotel in Seoul, South Korea.
NOVEMBER 20, 1998 : (NORTH KOREAN VESSEL ENTERS SOUTH KOREAN WATERS) The South Korean navy fires warning shots before chasing a North Korean spy vessel back across the maritime border near Kanghwa-do, northwest of the capital Seoul. http://asia.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/06/29/korea.navy.timeline.reut/
DECEMBER 18, 1998 : (SOUTH KOREA SINKS NORTH KOREAN SPY SUB) The South Korean navy sinks submersible North Korean spy vessel, with one frogman found dead in the Sea of Japan east of the Korean peninsula. http://asia.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/06/29/korea.navy.timeline.reut/
DECEMBER 19, 1998 : (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang attends holiday dinner at the White House with 465 other guests.
JAN.-JUNE 1999 : (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang makes a $10,000 donation to President Clinton's defense fund.
MARCH 29, 1999 : (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang goes to White House to watch N.C.A.A. championship game with President Clinton.
JULY 1999 : (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang receives letters endorsing his bid for Korea Life Insurance Company from Senator Torricelli, Rep. Carolyn Maloney, Rep. Gregory W. Meeks and a New Jersey state finance official.
OCT.-NOV. 1999 : (CHANG, DNC, MCAULIFFE, TORICELLI) Mr. Chang receives letters supporting his company's position on the repayment of debts owed by North Korea from several members of Congress.
Well in all fairness .. some links worked .. lol
The Clinton administration revealed Thursday that under the agreement it recently signed with North Korea, the Pyongyang government will get nearly $2 billion in benefits before it has to submit to special international inspections of its nuclear program.
South Korea will contribute most of the money by supplying the equipment for new nuclear reactors which make it much harder for North Korea to make weapons-grade fuel. However, Ambassador-at-large Robert Gallucci, the Clinton administration's top negotiator, also estimated that the costs to the United States will be "tens of millions of dollars."
The disclosures came at the first congressional hearing on the nuclear agreement. During the session, held by the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Asia, Republicans voiced considerable unhappiness about the deal the administration signed in Geneva in October.
"We seem to be giving up, virtually, on every front," complained Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska. He argued that the financial benefits North Korea are to receive will serve to "prop up" the impoverished Pyongyang government, so that it will be less susceptible to the threat of international economic sanctions.
The Clinton administration began negotiating with North Korea last year, after it refused to submit to the International Atomic Energy Agency's demand to carry out special inspections of two waste sites. Those inspections could show how much weapons-grade fuel North Korea produced in the past.
Under the deal, North Korea does not have to submit to the special inspections for approximately five years - until after "a significant portion" of the work is finished for the new nuclear reactors. Gallucci said that work was worth nearly $2 billion. North Korea will not get any of the key components for the reactors, however, until the special inspections are carried out.
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Or could it be that this is a subtle "buy-out" probe?
As in, "What will you pay me to dismantle my WMD facilities? Don't invade. We can be bought."
Strikes me as a saner business proposition than Saddam is trying to bring off...
A local newpaper in S. Korea reports that American nuclear submarine accidently bumped a Chinese fishing boat while doing a joint naval exercise with S. Korean navy. I do not know the scale of this exercise. But they were doing it for sure.
You may have it pegged. The US also gives N. Korea fuel oil in exchange for "cooperation", and they get cranky about interruptions:
August 25, 2002
N. Korea demands U.S. power payments
PYONGYANG, North Korea, Aug. 25 (UPI) -- The United States should compensate North Korea for electric power it has not received from delayed light water nuclear reactors the U.S. is helping build, the communist regime's broadcasting network said Sunday.
The demand for money from the United States came as officials from Japan, which has also pledged a large portion of the reactor project, visited North Korean officials in their capital in talks intended to establish diplomatic relations. "The most urgent matter in maintaining the Democratic People's Republic of Korea-U.S. Agreed Framework is the issue of compensating DPRK's electricity loss due to the United States delaying the provision of light water reactors," the broadcast commentary said. The United States, it said, "has made several excuses, intentionally delayed the construction and recently just started the basic concrete tamping." The project, deemed crucial to relieving North Korea's desperate shortage of electricity, "still lingers at the starting point" eight years after it was begun, the commentary said. "Severe difficulties," it continued, "are seriously threatening our livelihood."
Instead of hastening the project, the United States has again raised the issue of nuclear facility inspection, the commentary said, an issue that "will be resolved" when the reactors are built.
So the N Koreans want us to build them two, non-bomb making, nuclear power plants, and then it will talk with us about its other, bomb making, power plants. Expensive conversation.
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