RP wary of N. Korean power proposal

RP wary of N. Korean power proposal

MANILA (Reuter): A delegation seeking to raise funds for an organization set up to help defuse a North Korean nuclear threat failed to secure any new financial commitment from Manila, a senior Philippine official said yesterday.

The three-member team from the financially-troubled Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) met Philippine Foreign Secretary Domingo Siazon in an effort to drum up new funding.

Siazon later told reporters the Philippines remained committed to KEDO as a concept but did not want to get more deeply involved until it was clear what financial obligations this would entail. "We have committed support to KEDO but how much should we give?" Siazon said.

The delegation is touring member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which all have a stake in guaranteeing the security of the prosperous region. The team arrived here from Indonesia and leaves on Tuesday for the oil-rich sultanate of Brunei.

KEDO was set up to help implement a breakthrough 1994 agreement between the United States and North Korea which helped end a nuclear crisis.

The Stalinist state agreed as part of a US$4.5 billion deal to close down a reactor suspected of being part of a clandestine nuclear weapons program.

In return, KEDO is to arrange supplies of conventional fuel oil until two new and safer nuclear reactors are built.

KEDO has already run into problems, with the U.S. Congress slashing U.S. funding from $25 million to $13 million.

Japan has pledged $19 million while the European Commission has recommended European nations provide $18 million.

Philippine officials said Manila had paid $150,000.

Indonesia has pledged $325,000 worth of bunker oil, Malaysia has pledged $300,000, Thailand $100,000 and Singapore has offered $300,000 over three years, they said.

Siazon said he had repeated a proposal that ASEAN join KEDO as a group rather than individual members doing so, as a way to spread the financial burden more equitably.

He told reporters he planned to raise the issue at an ASEAN foreign ministers' meeting in Jakarta later this month.

KEDO delegation members were not available for comment. ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.