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pudgy
03-10-2003, 10:35 AM
anyone else think we may have our hand in the wrong cookie jar ?

pudgy
03-10-2003, 10:37 AM
I FORGOT THE ARTICLE
[ The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 3/10/03 ]

North Korea test-fires missile, says interception
of U.S. plane was defensive maneuver

The Associated Press


SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea test-fired a missile into the sea Monday in what was seen as an attempt to raise tension further in the standoff over its nuclear programs and pressure the United States into negotiations.

The widely anticipated launch from a base on North Korea's east coast fit a pattern of unusual military maneuvers in recent weeks, including the North's interception a week ago of a U.S. reconnaissance plane.

"This is another show of North Korean brinkmanship," said Yoon Dong-min, an expert at the state-funded Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security in Seoul.

"They are trying to raise the stakes in the nuclear standoff and trying to get the upper hand ahead of possible talks with the United States," Yoon said.

North Korea wants a nonaggression treaty and economic aid from the United States, but Washington says the U.N. Security Council should handle the nuclear problem.

In Washington, top Bush administration officials said Sunday the time still isn't ripe for one-on-one talks with North Korea and any lasting solution to the nuclear dispute will need the support of Russia, China and other nations.

"I think eventually we will be talking to North Korea, but we're not going to simply fall into what I believe is bad practice of saying the only way you can talk to us is directly, when it affects other nations in the region," Secretary of State Colin Powell said on CNN's "Late Edition."

Powell, on Fox News Sunday, said that during his visit to the United Nations last week, he worked with diplomats to develop a multinational approach to North Korea.

Democrats are pressing the Bush administration to begin direct talks immediately.

National security adviser Condoleezza Rice said on ABC's "This Week" that the United States isn't afraid to talk, "but we need to do so in a way that will bring maximum pressure on North Korea to actually this time not just freeze its weapons of mass destruction, but begin to dismantle them."

There had been indications that North Korea was planning to fire a missile. The Pentagon earlier cited a North Korean warning to ships to stay out of a sector off the east coast from Saturday to Tuesday.

Maj. Kim Ki-Beom, a spokesman at the South Korean Defense Ministry, said the missile was believed to be an anti-ship missile similar to one that North Korea test-fired on Feb. 24, the eve of the inauguration of South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun.

South Korean officials said the second missile was launched from a pad at Sinsang-ri and flew 68 miles. It had a range of 160 kilometers 99 miles.

South Korea was trying to determine whether the new test was successful. It had said the earlier one was a failure since it appeared to have exploded in midair due to defects.

The United States had sought to minimize the significance of the earlier missile test, saying it involved a small weapon and not one of North Korea's stockpile of long-range ballistic missiles.

U.S. and South Korean officials are more concerned about a possible North Korean test of a Taepodong-2 missile, which analysts believe is capable of reaching parts of the United States, though there are widespread doubts about its reach and accuracy. In 1998, North Korea test-fired a Taepodong-1 missile over Japan and into the Pacific.

North Korea has repeatedly accused the United States of plotting an attack, and says its military maneuvers are defensive.

In its first public comment on the March 2 plane interception, a state-run North Korean newspaper criticized the South Korean military for objecting to the maneuver off the North's east coast, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said.

Yonhap cited a North Korean newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, as saying that the dispatch of fighter jets to intercept the U.S. plane was a "just act of the right to self-defense."

Citing a senior defense official, The New York Times has reported that a North Korean pilot made the internationally recognized hand signals to follow him in an apparent attempt to take the U.S. crew hostage.

North Korean fighters illuminated the U.S. plane with targeting radar, but there was no hostile fire. The U.S. plane broke off its mission and returned to its base in Japan.

Rodong Sinmun also noted a statement by the South Korean Defense Ministry on Friday that expressed deep concern about the North Korean action and urged its neighbor's military to act with restraint.

"If South Korean authorities are at all interested in peace, they should speak out to the foreign power, the United States, which is threatening peace," the newspaper said.

For decades, North Korea has tried to undermine the alliance between Washington and Seoul with appeals for Korean solidarity in the face of what it calls foreign interference. Washington keeps 37,000 troops in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War.

The two Koreas embarked on a host of reconciliation projects after a summit of their leaders in 2000, but the process has been overshadowed by tension over the nuclear dispute.

In October, U.S. officials said Pyongyang admitted having a covert nuclear program in violation of a 1994 deal. Washington and its allies suspended fuel shipments; the North retaliated by expelling U.N. monitors, withdrawing from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and restarting a nuclear reactor.