By Jung Sung-ki
North Korea is said to have made few concessions when a top Chinese official visited Pyongyang last week to defuse tensions on the Korean Peninsula in the aftermath of the North’s artillery attack on a South Korean island last month, a Seoul official said Sunday.
Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang Thursday for discussions on the deadly shelling of Yeonpyeong Island off the western coast and tension-reducing measures.
The attack killed four South Koreans _ two marines and two civilians.
China briefed Seoul on the outcome of the Kim-Dai meeting through diplomatic channels Friday night, said the official, requesting anonymity.
“It appears that there is little difference in the North’s position,” he said, declining to elaborate. North Korea argues it fired shells onto Yeonpyeong in response to South Korea’s maritime live-fire drills near the Northern Limit Line (NLL).
The South said the drills were held within its territory, not violating any inter-Korean and international agreements.
Beijing has been under growing international pressure to exercise its influence to discourage North Korea from further provocative acts.
China is considered to have the strongest influence over Pyongyang as it is the impoverished nation's biggest provider of food and energy aid as well as diplomatic support.
But Beijing has been unwilling to use the leverage apparently out of concern that instability in the North could hurt its economic and political interests.
North Korea continued to threaten the South over the weekend, accusing South Korea and the United States of plotting a war against it.
“The army and people of the DPRK (North Korea) are ready for both an escalation and an all-out war,” said a statement issued by the North's Peace Committee, a quasi-party agency. “They will deal merciless retaliatory blows at the provocateurs and aggressors and blow up their citadels and bases.”
The statement, carried by the Korean Central News Agency, also denounced a pledge by the South Korean and U.S. militaries to launch joint counterattacks against the North should it attack the South again.
Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, flew to Seoul last week for talks with his South Korean counterpart Gen. Han Min-koo.
In a joint conference, the top military commanders vowed to strengthen joint capabilities to respond to any further North Korean provocations and hold more joint drills in the West Sea.