The Korean dilemma

American Republican nominee Bob Dole may have been indulging in campaign hyperbole when he accused President Bill Clinton of giving food aid to a North Korea "that devotes its own resources to the appetite of an insatiable military". Yet, there is reason to suspect that there might be more to the North Korean situation than meets the eye. Of a desperate food shortage -- at least for ordinary people -- there can be no doubt. But no matter how much help is poured in, a recurrence cannot be ruled out unless structural reforms are also carried out.

What matters right now is why the North does not appear to have spent a cent of the US$130 million that eight Western insurance companies have reportedly paid for the lost harvest. It is not enough to claim that it has not been squandered on weapons, it is culpable, even criminal under the circumstances, that this money, which could have paid for 420,000 tons of rice to feed 20 million people for a month, does not appear to have ameliorated distress. Such apparent callousness can only fuel suspicion of stockpiling food for the military on which the North spends US$6 billion out of an estimated gross national product of US$21.2 billion.

Hence, the dilemma for the donor governments, especially of South Korea, the United States and Japan, which are involved in the November 1994 accord under which North Korea agreed to freeze its suspected nuclear program in exchange for two light-water reactors to replace its outmoded graphite-moderated ones. South Korea, the U.S. and China are also waiting for the North's response to the proposal for four-party talks to replace the 1953 truce with a peace treaty. Once these issues are out of the way, work can start on a concerted long-term approach to economic problems. But not only is Pyongyang dragging its feet on both matters, its churlish treatment of generous shipments of rice from the South seems also calculated (like its recent antics in the demilitarized zone) to alienate the Seoul government.

Nevertheless, Seoul is prepared to take a comprehensive view of the North's difficulties. It is ready to provide the bulk of the US$4 billion needed for the light-water reactors, and it is willing to promote joint ventures and economic cooperation preparatory to a serious discussion of unification. Without actually rejecting these moves, Pyongyang continues to obstruct them, apparently still hoping to bypass its southern neighbor and reach some kind of agreement with the U.S.

Two factors might encourage this expectation. First, concerned primarily with nuclear proliferation, the Americans seem to fear that a Pyongyang that feels it is at bay might renege on the hard-won accord of October 1994. Second, as in Vietnam, the U.S. attaches considerable importance to obtaining an accounting of 8,100 missing American soldiers. So much so that Washington agreed to pay US$2 million for the 162 sets of remains that Pyongyang turned over in 1993 and 1994.

These understandable concerns can best be served by addressing the need to secure a permanent peace. That the U.S. can do most effectively not by going it alone, but through a joint strategy with Pyongyang's closest neighbor. After all, South Korea has to live with the problem. It cannot afford to be anything but realistic.

-- The Straits Times, Singapore