SEOUL, Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Tuesday that China might be willing to cooperate in denuclearizing North Korea amid growing ties between Pyongyang and Moscow, noting that Russian President Vladimir Putin is unlikely to be cooperative.
“I think that we must convince China first that nuclear weapons in North Korea are not in China’s interest,” Rice said during a forum in Seoul.
“I don’t believe we can get Mr. Putin to cooperate at this point, but I am still hopeful that China might,” she said, recalling Beijing’s role as host of the now-defunct six-nation talks in the 2000s aimed at ending North Korea’s nuclear ambition.
China is North Korea’s most important trading partner, giving Beijing significant leverage over Pyongyang. However, China has long been under fire from critics for being reluctant to enforce tougher measures against North Korea, apparently worried that such a move could destabilize its neighbor.
Rice, the current director of the Hoover Institution at Stanford Un
iversity after serving under President George W. Bush from 2005 to 2009, called North Korean leader Kim Jong-un “a very strange and erratic man.”
North Korea conducted its sixth and last nuclear test in September 2017 and enshrined its nuclear power status in its constitution in September, a move that illustrates it has no intention of giving up its nuclear program.
Adding to concerns over a partnership pact signed between Kim and Putin during their summit in Pyongyang last month, Pyongyang has carried out a series of missile tests in recent weeks.
When asked about the potential impact of the upcoming U.S. election in November, Rice said, “Any American president will be determined not to let North Korea create instability on the Korean Peninsula.”
Rice said that the current U.S. administration has not been very active in engaging with North Korea due to other urgent issues, but she expressed confidence that whoever is elected will “return to this issue very strongly.”
Attention is also on how former U.S.
President Donald Trump would handle the North Korean issue if he were to secure a second term, with some observers expressing concerns that he may take an unpredictable course of action.
“President Trump tried to directly address Kim Jong-un, but Kim did not respond and cooperate,” she said. “If he returns, Trump will understand that you cannot deal with a dictator in that manner.”
On Tuesday, President Yoon Suk Yeol met with Rice at the presidential office to exchange opinions about the war in Ukraine and relations between Russia and North Korea, as well as the security situation on the Korean Peninsula, according to his office.
During the meeting, Yoon asked for her continued support in making progress on North Korea’s denuclearization and human rights issues, and Rice vowed to make efforts to strengthen the alliance between South Korea and the United States, Yoon’s office said.
Source: Yonhap News Agency