North Korea defiantly declared itself a nuclear power Monday at the start of the first full international arms talks since its atomic test and threatened to increase its arsenal if its demands were not met.
Reiterating those demands in its opening speech, the North said the United Nations must lift the sanctions imposed on the communist nation for its Oct. 9 nuclear test. It also said the United States must remove the financial restrictions that led the North to break off the six-nation negotiations 13 months ago.
The North also said it wants a reactor built for it and help covering its energy needs in the meantime, according to a summary of the speech released by one of the delegations involved. Five nations are trying to persuade the North to abandon nuclear weapons — the United States, China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.
The North said that now that it is a nuclear power, it should be treated on equal footing with the U.S. It warned that if its demands were not met, it would increase its arsenal, according to the summary.
Show him the money. Oh, and the Pillsbury Nuke Boy wants a pony, too.
Screw them. They are dying as pressure piles up on the regime. Our side should talk to the nutballs, smile at them politely, and let that horrible regime die. Squeeze them.
North Korea just wants the goodies and will never give up nukes--not even if we send Madeleine Albright to dance with the pudgy freak with a bad haircut.
Not a sixpence, people. Not a sixpence.
UPDATE: I think we may have our John Bolton replacement. Though Jeff is willing to give more money than I think is appropriate. Heh. ("Heh" will probably soon be a registered trademark of the Instapundit, so I use it while I can.)
LAST UPDATE: The talks are over with no results and no new meetings planned. As I expected, we each wanted to talk about different things. We wanted to discuss North Korea renouncing nuclear weapons. For North Korea, it was all about the money.
The South Koreans surely wish North Korea to deal:
The mainstream South Korean daily JoongAng Ilbo cautioned Pyongyang against dragging its heels.
"If North Korea holds its ground obstinately, it will only face more serious isolation and pain," it said in an editorial.
But their commentary misses the point. We know North Korea won't give up nukes. They may agree to give up nukes, but they've agreed to that before. It is all about saying what they need to say to convince us to give them money. It worked before, why not now they think?
The talks are all about inflicting serious isolation and pain on North Korea until they collapse or face a revolt of the people or armed forces.
