DPRK NUCLEAR PROGRAMS: GOR REACTION TO NON-PAPER

C O N F I D E N T I A L MOSCOW 003979

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/08/2017
TAGS: PREL MNUC KNNP KN KS CH JP RS
SUBJECT: DPRK NUCLEAR PROGRAMS: GOR REACTION TO NON-PAPER

REF: STATE 105500

Classified By: A/POL Colin Cleary. Reasons 1.4(B/D)


1. (C) Grigoriy Berdennikov, the GOR's representative to the
Six-Party First Working Group -- Denuclearization of the
Korean Peninsula -- told us that the GOR, in principle,
agrees with reftel non-paper. However, Berdennikov
underlined that the paper should serve not as the starting
point, but as the end product of the Working Group (WG)'s
long negotiations. Berdennikov, who spent seven years in
Vienna as the GOR's envoy to the IAEA and UN, predicted that
if the paper were presented at the WG meeting in Shenyang,
August 16-17, "the show would stop immediately."


2. (C) At the July Beijing Plenary, the DPRK chief
negotiator for the Six-Party Talks rejected a proposal that
the North be obliged to declare all nuclear weapon programs
as part of the February 13 agreement. According to
Berdennikov, a demand for the immediate and complete
transparency on all programs would be unrealistic. The GOR's
position is a stage-by-stage approach covering simple to more
"intrusive" areas.


3. (C) Berdennikov noted that the August 16-17 session will
be, in fact, the first with any substance. He recalled that,
with the Six-Party process stalemated and the DPRK refusing
to discuss its nuclear programs, the first WG session in
Beijing in February had "amounted to nothing." For this
reason, Berdennikov thought, nobody knows how the session
should progress. He noted that the U.S. paper was the only
document that the GOR received on the WG.


4. (C) According to Berdennikov, the WG session should try
to build on the momentum created by a series of "good events"
-- including the IAEA team's visit to the North, the closure
of the five DPRK nuclear facilities and the imminent
South-North Korean summit. For this session, the GOR hopes
to achieve an agreement on "what needs to be declared," and
some level of understanding on "disablement." He noted that
the "strategic ambiguity" introduced by the new term,
"disablement," rather than the conventional "dismantlement,"
may give the North more bargaining room. "Irreversible"
disablement, he said, will predictably lead to the North's
demand for a light water reactor.
RUSSELL