By Jung Sung-ki
President Lee Myung-bak said Saturday that the issue of North Korea’s uranium enrichment program should be brought to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).
He made the remarks during a meeting with Japanese Foreign Minister Seiji Maehara at Cheong Wa Dae.
Maehara arrived in Seoul earlier in the day for talks with his South Korean counterpart Kim Sung-hwan. It was his first visit to South Korea since he took office in September.
“The issue of North Korea’s uranium enrichment program should be referred to the UNSC,” Lee was quoted by his spokeswoman Kim Hee-jung as saying.
Maehara was quoted as telling Lee, “I absolutely agree.”
Pyongyang, which has boycotted any international denuclearization talks, heightened regional security fears last November by revealing an apparently operational uranium enrichment plant to a visiting U.S. scholar.
The communist regime claims the plant was built to generate electricity, but Seoul and its allies believe it could easily be reconfigured to produce weapons-grade uranium to augment the country’s existing plutonium stockpile.
The six-party talks involving the United States, the two Koreas, China, Japan and Russia have been in limbo, after the North pulled out of the talks and announced it would resume its nuclear enrichment program in response to United Nations sanctions imposed on it after it conducted a second nuclear test in April 2009.
The Japanese top diplomat said inter-Korean dialogue should precede the resumption of the multinational talks, according to the spokeswoman.
“Inter-Korean dialogue should precede the six-way talks and for that, the North needs to take a clearly responsible attitude in connection with the Cheonan and Yeonpyeong incidents,” Maehara was quoted as saying.
Maehara and South Korean Foreign Minister Kim affirmed the same stance in their meeting earlier the same day.
Cross-border tensions have spiked since the North’s back-to-back provocations near the disputed sea border in the western Sea.
In March last year, South Korean Navy’s frigate Cheonan was allegedly torpedoed by a North Korean submarine. Forty-six sailors were killed in the sinking.
In November, the North shelled Yeonpyeong Island near the sea border, the Northern Limit Line, killing four people.
“President Lee and Minister Maehara shared the view that North Korea must change its attitude with sincerity for the resumption of the six-way talks,” said Kim.
The Japanese minister conveyed Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s invitation for Lee to visit Japan, she said, adding Lee had accepted Kan’s invitation.
Maehara also raised the need for Seoul and Tokyo to forge a free trade agreement.