Allies vow to get tougher with N. Korea

By Yi Whan-woo

The top nuclear envoys of South Korea, the United States and Japan agreed Wednesday to step up efforts to take tougher sanctions against North Korea for its alleged hydrogen bomb test last week.

“We have found common ground that North Korea needs to pay the price for what it did,” said Hwang Joon-kook, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ special representative for Korean Peninsula Peace and Security Affairs. “We shared thoughts that the three allies need to differentiate their joint policy toward North Korea and press Pyongyang in a more powerful and compressive manner.”

U.S. Special Representative for North Korea Policy Sung Kim stressed a need for “new and meaningful sanctions” against the Kim Jong-un regime.

Their comments came after a three-way meeting between Hwang, Kim and Kimihiro Ishikane, director-general of the Japanese foreign ministry’s Asian and Oceania Affairs Bureau, at Lotte Hotel in downtown Seoul.

The three top negotiators in the stalled six-party talks on Pyongyang’s denuclearization met to discuss their joint responses to the North’s claim on Jan. 6 that it tested its first H-bomb.

If true, it would be Pyongyang’s fourth nuclear test following the previous ones in 2006, 2009 and 2013.

“We’ll push the U.N. Security Council (UNSC) to adopt a resolution against North Korea and we’ll employ all possible means to do this,” Hwang said. “We’ll work closely with China and Russia as well.”

Both Beijing and Moscow are also members of the six-party talks, suspended since 2008.

Hwang will visit China and Russia for one-on-one meetings with his respective counterparts.

He will fly to Beijing Thursday and brief Wu Dawei, the special representative for the Chinese government on Korean Peninsula affairs, about the trilateral meeting in Seoul.

China is largely seen as being reluctant to exert influence on North Korea and punish the Kim regime in line with international demands.

Hwang will visit Moscow on Jan. 19 for a meeting with Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Margulov.

Given the serious nature of the Kim regime’s nuclear ambitions, Seoul, Washington and Tokyo have underscored their need to bolster their joint security alliance, according to the government.

As part of their efforts, the three nations will hold a vice foreign ministerial meeting in Tokyo, Saturday.

First Vice Foreign Minister Lim Sung-nam will meet U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Akitaka Saiki in a dialogue of the highest level involving all three allies.

In a telephone conversation, Jan. 7, President Park Geun-hye and U.S. President Barack Obama agreed to closely cooperate to ensure that the UNSC adopts a resolution against North Korea.