MEDIA REACTION - DISARMING NORTH KOREA'S NUCLEAR PROGRAM

UNCLAS SANTIAGO 000279

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

STATE FOR IIP/G/WHA, INR/R/MR, WHA/BSC, WHA/PDA, EAP/K

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: KMDR KPAO OPRC CI KN
SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION - DISARMING NORTH KOREA'S NUCLEAR PROGRAM


1. On February 16, government-owned, editorially independent "La
Nacion" (circ. 4,200) carried a column by international analyst Raul
Sohr entitled, "Winds of Peace in North Korea." Quotes:


2. "Bad peace is worth more than a good war and that is what the
west, led by the United States, has accomplished with North
Korea.... For George Bush, the agreement with North Korea is
bittersweet. For the right, headed by John Bolton...it sends the
wrong signal in the sense that a country set on proliferation can
expect to be compensated if it refrains from it. Bolton says this
promotes extortion. The Democrats, although pleased with the
agreement, accuse Bush of stubbornly abandoning the path begun by
Bill Clinton, just to return to it but in worse conditions.


3. "But in the long term these differences will not matter. The
Korean peninsula and a good part of Asia could be left outside the
nuclear threat and, perhaps in a day not far from now, North Korea
can join its neighbors and enjoy the economic bonanza they have been
enjoying for some decades."

KELLY