History > 2006 > USA > International (IV)

NYT        October 14, 2006

Restraints Fray and Risks Grow as Nuclear Club Gains Members        NYT        15.10.2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/15/world/asia/15nuke.html

Rice’s Counselor Gives Advice Others May Not Want to Hear

October 28, 2006
The New York Times
By HELENE COOPER and DAVID E. SANGER

WASHINGTON, Oct. 27 — For the last 18 months, Philip D. Zelikow has churned out confidential memorandums and proposals for his boss and close friend, Condoleezza Rice, that often depart sharply from the Bush administration’s current line.

One described the potential for Iraq to become a “catastrophic failure.” Another, among several that have come to light in recent weeks, was an early call for changes in a detention policy that many in the State Department believed was doing tremendous harm to the United States.

Others have proposed new diplomatic initiatives toward North Korea and the Middle East, and one went as far as to call for a reconsideration of the phrase “war on terror” because it alienated many Muslims — an idea that quickly fizzled after opposition from the White House.

Such ideas would have found a more natural home under President George H. W. Bush, for whom Mr. Zelikow and Ms. Rice worked on the staff of the National Security Council. They reflect a sense that American influence is perishable, and can be damaged by overreaching, as allies and other partners react against decisions made in Washington. They form a kind of foreign policy realism that was eclipsed in Mr. Bush’s first term, in favor of a more ideological, unilateral ethos, but that has made something of a comeback in his second term.

Whether Mr. Zelikow, 52, is giving voice to Ms. Rice’s private views, or simply serving as an in-house contrarian, remains unclear. Some of his ideas have become policy: he had called for the closure of secret prisons run by the Central Intelligence Agency a year before the Supreme Court decision that prodded the Bush administration to empty them.

The United States offered North Korea a chance to negotiate a permanent peace treaty, per Mr. Zelikow’s advice, and he, along with Ms. Rice, was one of the backers of the Iran initiative, in which President Bush offered to reverse three decades of American policy against direct talks with Tehran if Iran suspended its uranium enrichment.

Neither North Korea nor Iran has bitten on the initiatives, but America’s allies have applauded them. Mr. Zelikow’s assessments of the Iraq war, first disclosed in Bob Woodward’s book “State of Denial,” were presented to Ms. Rice in 2005.

Ms. Rice keeps Mr. Zelikow close at hand, and the fact that his memorandums have surfaced in recent books and news articles suggests, at a minimum, that he and his allies are aggressively lobbying for his ideas. Mr. Zelikow (pronounced ZELL-i-ko) is being talked about inside the State Department as an outside shot for the vacant job of deputy secretary of state, but some believe that his management style is too combative for the job.

Friends of both officials say that Ms. Rice appears to regard Mr. Zelikow as a kind of intellectual anchor during what has been a turbulent period for American foreign policy, in Iraq and beyond.

“He’s a very important intellectual resource, even if she may not always agree with him,” said Brent Scowcroft, the former national security adviser, who has been a mentor to both.

Michael A. McFaul, a political science professor at Stanford University who knows both the secretary of state and Mr. Zelikow, said that “the limited results” of the administration’s approach had “created space for guys like” Mr. Zelikow.

Mr. Zelikow is hardly a household name, even at the State Department, where his title is counselor to the secretary of state. He has few staffers, no line authority, and occupies an office at the very end of the hall on the seventh floor, where Ms. Rice and other top officials also have their offices. He is a sometimes-geeky intellectual known for fingernails that are bitten down to nubs.

But questions about his role were sharpened last month after Mr. Zelikow gave a speech at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in which he offered what many believed was an oblique criticism of the decision by Mr. Bush and Ms. Rice not to push Israel to return to the negotiating table with the Palestinians. He also said progress in that conflict was essential to forming a consensus among the United States, moderate Arabs and Europeans on Iran.

The address may have been an example of what Mr. Zelikow, in two speeches last year, called “practical idealism.” But it did not go over well. The State Department quickly distanced itself from the speech, issuing a statement denying any linkage, and Israeli officials, flustered by Mr. Zelikow’s remarks, said Ms. Rice later assured the Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, that the United States saw the Iranian and Palestinian issues as two separate matters.

Neither Ms. Rice nor Mr. Zelikow would comment for this article.

But friends of both Ms. Rice and Mr. Zelikow say her initial decision to appoint Mr. Zelikow to the counselor post last year reflects her openness to views at odds with the more ideological approach that has been dominant under President Bush.

Ms. Rice had to expend a substantial amount of her own political capital to get the White House to support her choice, friends say, given Mr. Zelikow’s previous job as staff director of the 9/11 Commission, where he played a major role in writing the report that took both the Clinton and Bush administrations to task for failing to act with sufficient seriousness against the threat from Al Qaeda.

But Ms. Rice arrived at the State Department insistent that she would surround herself with her own people, friends say. Vice President Dick Cheney wanted her to appoint his former deputy national security adviser, Eric S. Edelman, as her political director; she balked and instead chose R. Nicholas Burns, a friend who had worked for her at the security council during the administration of the first President Bush. Likewise, in choosing Mr. Zelikow as her counselor, she eschewed Elliott L. Abrams, a darling of neoconservatives and the pro-Israel lobby.

Mr. Zelikow and Ms. Rice co-authored a book about Germany’s reunification, “Germany Unified and Europe Transformed: A Study in Statecraft” (Harvard University Press, 1995). It is not exactly light reading, but at its core it is a study in realpolitik, examining — and admiring — the tempered, carefully managed American response to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

It is a book that Mr. Zelikow could write again today, but one that Ms. Rice could not, friends and associates of both say. Ms. Rice herself has said that she went through something of a transformation after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, in which she moved away from the classical realism of her own roots and Mr. Zelikow’s, and closer to the neoconservatives who dominated policy discussions in the first term. Ms. Rice has told friends that President Bush has had a major impact on her thinking in terms of reintroducing values-based politics and ideology.

An example of the distance between Mr. Zelikow and his boss emerged this summer, at the start of the Israel-Hezbollah conflict. The position adopted by Ms. Rice — that Israel be permitted to continue its bombardment of Hezbollah despite the mounting civilian death toll in Lebanon — satisfied conservatives in the administration, including Mr. Cheney, who were pushing for strong American support of Israel.

That support also included the decision by the administration to heed Israel’s desire that America not push it to resolve the Palestinian conflict until the Palestinian Authority improved security and cracked down on attacks by groups considered to be terrorist entities by Israel and the United States.

But in his speech to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Mr. Zelikow implicitly acknowledged that that stance does not win America any friends in the Muslim world, and thwarts other American foreign policy objectives.

Joseph Nye, the former dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and one of Mr. Zelikow’s friends, said, “If you look at the distance where the administration went away from the realism of the 2000 campaign, Philip never went on that kind of excursion.”

Mr. Zelikow sat out the first Bush term, running the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. But Ms. Rice turned to him for key tasks, and he drafted much of the 2002 “National Security Strategy of the United States,” the document that fundamentally reordered American national security doctrine after the Sept. 11 attacks.

He became the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, from where he pressured Ms. Rice to turn over highly classified intelligence estimates and testify in front of the commission. Officials who worked with him marveled at his industry and precision, but described him as far more opinionated than his gather-the-numbers approach might first suggest. Staffers on the commission said other colleagues were assigned the task of smoothing over the bruised egos of those who had crossed Mr. Zelikow.

The position of counselor to the secretary of state, a post that over the years has been filled by some of Washington’s brightest diplomatic lights, allows Mr. Zelikow to fly under the radar, and Ms. Rice has used that flexibility from the beginning of her term, when he was sent off to Iraq to provide an outsider’s assessment of what had gone wrong.

    Rice’s Counselor Gives Advice Others May Not Want to Hear, NYT, 28.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/28/world/28zelikow.html?hp&ex=1162094400&en=c0a1e779efea5ad9&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Egypt, Under Stress, Sees U.S. as Pain and Remedy

October 22, 2006
The New York Times
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN

CAIRO, Oct. 20 — Faced with twin political threats — a rising Islamic movement at home and diminished influence throughout the region — Egypt is pressing the United States for an aggressive promotion of Palestinian statehood as a means of strengthening itself and other Arab governments allied with Washington, senior officials say.

Egyptian officials told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on her recent visit here that the United States should move straight “to the endgame,” with a major policy initiative tackling the most contentious Palestinian issues: borders of a future state, the site of the capital, and the so-called right of return for Palestinian refugees.

Whether Washington agrees — a senior Egyptian official with first-hand knowledge of the conversation said Ms. Rice seemed to be listening — Egypt’s request is evidence of growing concern and frustration here. The leadership is showing signs of vulnerability, and in large measure it has blamed American actions in the Middle East for many of its problems, from the rise of Iran as a regional power to the growing popularity of political Islam.

Egyptians and other Arab leaders who are friendly with the United States see a major regional peace initiative by Washington as the first necessary step toward stealing momentum from Islamic groups, officials here said. In Egypt, however, optimism is limited that Washington will put the stated interests of its Arab allies ahead of the perceived interests of Israel.

“There is a realization that strategic estrangement in the post-Iraq period has been harmful to both sides,” said Abdel Moneim Said, the director of Egypt’s premier research center, the Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, and a member of the governing National Democratic Party. “Both are going through a series of reassessments of their positions.”

Egypt itself is in a moment of political twilight, so the regional and domestic challenges it faces appear magnified. The situation is delicate, and officials interviewed spoke only on condition of anonymity.

While its critics say the government’s own failure to combat poverty, corruption and political oppression is to blame for its weakened state, officials say the United States has undermined them. The invasion of Iraq has put Baghdad into Iran’s orbit; the insistence on democratic elections allowed Hamas to gain power in the Palestinian areas; and, more recently, the refusal to press for a speedy end to Israel’s bombardment of Lebanon helped lionize Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the militant group Hezbollah.

Add to the mix the fact that President Hosni Mubarak is 78 and has ruled Egypt for 25 years. Increasingly, it appears he is trying to pave the way for his son Gamal to inherit the presidency. But there is no consensus among the ruling elite. Some are concerned that the son would lack legitimacy unless selected through a free and democratic process, which Egypt has shown no hint of supporting.

And there is no certainty that the military would go along with the president’s son, who would be the first president from outside the armed forces since the monarchy was overthrown in 1952.

For all the hand-wringing, experts agree that a sudden political crisis is unlikely in Egypt, or at least not the kind that would lead to an Islamist-led revolution. But the confluence of internal uncertainty and external pressures has affected Egypt’s policies, and its regional influence.

For example, despite repeated efforts, Egypt has been powerless to stabilize the conflict between the main Palestinian factions, Hamas and Fatah. In the past, Egypt’s security services were influential, and effective, in the Palestinian areas.

On the domestic front, Egyptian officials have stepped up repression as a means to blunt the rising popularity of the Muslim Brotherhood, locking up its leaders without charge. There also is talk of amending the Constitution to avoid the embarrassing prospect of only one candidate for president, but in such a way as to prohibit any independent candidates aligned with the Brotherhood. The group has been the only credible opposition.

In its foreign relations, for the first time in nearly three decades Egypt is trying to improve business ties with Russia, and President Mubarak plans to visit China next month. Top government and party officials have also made aggressive public statements aimed at embarrassing, or challenging, the United States. In one notable scene when Ms. Rice was in Cairo, she and the Egyptian foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, appeared together at a news conference beamed live around the world.

“I’ve spoken about Ayman Nour each time that I meet with my Egyptian counterpart,” Ms. Rice replied when asked by a reporter if she was still pushing for the release of Mr. Nour, the imprisoned opposition political leader.

“You didn’t raise it today,” Mr. Aboul Gheit interjected without hesitation.

But these efforts, the moves toward Russia and China, and the aggressive public remarks from officials mask a reality that is driving the government to press the United States to become more engaged in the Arab-Israeli peace effort.

“You can’t have a deal in the Middle East without the Americans, regardless of the judgment we carry,” one government official said.

Many people, inside and outside government, say the roots of the government’s problems lie more in its domestic failures than in outside pressure. Although Egypt’s government has moved to improve macroeconomic policies, for example, a vast majority of this nation of 70 million live in deep poverty.

While they talk about moving toward democracy, Egyptian authorities have canceled elections, prohibited the creation of new parties and locked up political opponents. “The state is failing to meet its most basic responsibilities, starting with providing clear drinking water,” said Mustapha Kamel, a political science professor at American University in Cairo. “There is a feeling the ruling team does not have a good vision for dealing with the problems of the country.”

The popularity of political Islam in Egypt, many political analysts said, is not a result of the Palestinian crisis. “It is not because the Brotherhood is religious, but because the public is fed up with the ruling party and their promises,” said Abdallah al-Ashaal, a former assistant to the foreign minister who now teaches international law and relations at Cairo University.

But Dr. Ashaal did say Egypt — and the United States — would benefit greatly if the Palestinian issue were addressed. “If you find a fair solution to the Palestinian problem, you pave the way for talks with all parties,” he said, referring to Syria and Lebanon as well.

So in an atmosphere of distrust of the United States, officials here are still hoping that Washington will heed their call. “You can’t achieve peace without the United States,” said Hesham Youssef, chief of staff at the Arab League, “but we can’t continue business as usual.”

Mona el-Naggar contributed reporting.

    Egypt, Under Stress, Sees U.S. as Pain and Remedy, NYT, 22.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/22/world/africa/22egypt.html?hp&ex=1161576000&en=1fd8c89cd90b55ab&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Rice Criticizes Russia’s Limits on News Media

October 22, 2006
The New York Times
By THOM SHANKER

MOSCOW, Oct. 21 — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice criticized shrinking Russian press freedoms, questioned the enforcement of a restrictive new law on foreign private groups here and called for eased tensions between Russia and neighboring Georgia when she arrived here Saturday to discuss the North Korean nuclear crisis.

Ms. Rice’s remarks raised the possibility of a testy atmosphere for the discussions in Moscow, the last stop of her pan-Asia trip aimed at urging tough enforcement of the Security Council sanctions imposed on North Korea a week ago in response to its Oct. 9 underground nuclear test.

In a symbolic decision that no doubt will be scrutinized by the Kremlin leadership, Ms. Rice invited senior editors of Novaya Gazeta, a leading independent journal, to a meeting at her hotel. The session, which included the son of the assassinated journalist Anna Politkovskaya, came just before she headed into official government meetings.

Earlier, Ms. Rice said that the future of a free Russian press and electronic media “is a major concern” of the United States government.

“There is still an independent print press,” she said. “Unfortunately, there is not much left of independent television in Russia.”

Ms. Politkovskaya, shot to death this month in what appeared to be a professional killing, had made a name for herself with tough reporting on the war in Chechnya, and was a fierce critic of the administration of President Vladimir V. Putin.

Mr. Putin, who was to meet with Ms. Rice not long after her session with Ms. Politkovskaya’s colleagues and the journalist’s son, Ilya Politkovsky, has described the killing as “a crime of loathsome brutality,” but also said that “her influence on political life was extremely insignificant in scale.”

Ms. Rice told correspondents traveling aboard her plane that she also would ask Russian leaders to explain the enforcement of a new law that requires foreign nongovernmental organizations to register with the government. The deadline for registration was last Thursday, and dozens of the groups, many of them highly critical of the Kremlin, were told to cease operations until their registration applications had been processed. How long that will take is unclear.

“In some cases it is being implemented in ways that are making it difficult for NGO’s to operate, and so I think we have to go over that,” Ms. Rice said.

A senior State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity in accordance with diplomatic protocol, said later Saturday that three organizations at the center of the debate — the National Democratic Institute, the International Republican Institute and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace — had successfully registered. Even so, the official said, the United States still sees no guarantee that “Russia will not abuse this law and this process.”

As she began a day of meetings that was to include lunch with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and a dinner with Defense Minister Sergei B. Ivanov, Ms. Rice said she planned to urge Moscow to reduce any chance for increasing conflict with neighboring Georgia. Simmering Russia-Georgia animosity escalated this month after Georgia detained four Russian military personnel for suspected espionage.

The senior State Department official described Ms. Rice’s discussions with Mr. Lavrov on Georgia as “constructive.” The official added: “I’m not here to tell you that all will be well. I’m here to tell you we had a good conversation” on potential steps to help ease tensions between the two countries.

On North Korea, Ms. Rice cast doubts on South Korean press reports that the North’s leader, Kim Jong-il, had expressed regret to a visiting Chinese envoy for ordering the nuclear test and had pledged not to detonate another nuclear device.

Ms. Rice said she was given no information to confirm those press reports during her talks in Beijing on Friday and said she believed that the North Koreans “would like to see an escalation of the tension.”

During her talks in Moscow, Ms. Rice said, she also intended to discuss efforts to halt not only North Korea’s nuclear program, but Iran’s. Before her arrival, Mr. Lavrov, the foreign minister, told a Kuwaiti news service that his government would not allow the Security Council to be a vehicle for pressuring Iran over its nuclear program.

    Rice Criticizes Russia’s Limits on News Media, NYT, 22.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/22/world/europe/22rice.html?hp&ex=1161576000&en=afeb5a49d76527db&ei=5094&partner=homepage

U.S. and China Seek to Resume North Korea Talks

October 20, 2006
The New York Times
By THOM SHANKER and JOSEPH KAHN

BEIJING, Oct. 20 -- The United States and China spoke today in a unified voice to call for North Korea to return to six-party talks on its nuclear program, emphasizing hopes for a diplomatic solution to the standoff.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she was told by the Chinese government that a special envoy sent by Beijing to North Korea had delivered "a strong message." And the Chinese foreign minister, standing beside Ms. Rice, pledged his nation’s commitment to breaking the stalemate over the North’s nuclear program.

In language both used to address the North Korean leadership, Ms. Rice and Li Zhaoxing, China’s foreign minister, sounded as if they were reading if not from the same page at least from the same big script.

"We hope that all the relevant parties will maintain coolheadedness, adopt a prudent and responsible approach and adhere to dialogue and peaceful resolution as the general direction of our efforts," said Mr. Li.

"On our part, we are ready to maintain and continue to strengthen our consultation and cooperation with all the other parties to strive to break the stalemate as soon as possible and reconvene the six party talks," Mr. Li added.

Ms. Rice stressed that North Korea should return to those talks "without condition," and that financial restrictions would not be lifted just to entice the North back to the negotiations.

In comments to reporters later, Ms. Rice expressed confidence that China was committed to enforcing new United Nations sanctions on North Korea, and that a number of economic and trade measures were under review.

Asked specifically whether the Chinese were considering a halt to its life-sustaining oil supplies sent to North Korea, Ms. Rice said the Chinese government had told her it "will consider a whole host of measures."

As she neared the end of a fast-paced swing through Japan, South Korea and China, with a final stop in Moscow planned for the weekend, Ms. Rice said that creating a new, multilateral mechanism to halt North Korea’s trade in nuclear bomb-making materials and missiles would take time, and she emphasized that "this is an early trip."

The six-nation talks over North Korea’s nuclear program ended in stalemate after multiple rounds in 2004 and 2005. Mr. Kim ignored Chinese pressure to return to the bargaining table, and raised tensions in the region by conducting a missile test in July and the nuclear test on Oct. 9.

Some Chinese experts say they hope Mr. Kim, emboldened by becoming the world’s latest nuclear power, may be eager to resume negotiations and see what kind of price he can extract from the outside world in exchange for slowing or scrapping his nuclear program now.

But others here doubt he has any intention of rolling back the nuclear program, the culmination of an enormously expensive effort begun by Mr. Kim’s father, Kim Il-sung, after the Korean War.

Both Japan and South Korea have warned that they detected signs Mr. Kim may be preparing a second nuclear test, a event that both the United States and China say would trigger a new and harsher set of sanctions on the already isolated country.

There were mixed signs today about the potential for resuming talks. Mr. Kim on Thursday met Tang Jiaxuan, a Chinese state councilor and an emissary of President Hu Jintao. China did not publicly reveal the substance of the talks in Pyongyang beyond saying they were "in-depth" and "greatly significant."

But the prominent coverage given Mr. Tang’s mission in China’s state-controlled media today suggested that Beijing considered the results of the trip worth publicizing.

Mr. Tang also met Ms. Rice today and was quoted by state media as calling the results of his talks with Mr. Kim "positive."

A South Korean newspaper, Chosun Ilbo, citing diplomatic sources in China, reported today that Mr. Kim had offered to return to six-party talks. But the report said he reiterated a demand that the United States first drop unilateral financial sanctions that the Treasury Department imposed last year to crack down on suspected drug running and counterfeiting by North Korean interests.

"If the U.S. makes a concession to some degree, we will also make a concession to some degree, whether it be bilateral talks or six-party talks," Mr. Kim was quoted as saying by the Chosen Ilbo.

The newspaper also said Mr. Kim "expressed regret" for the nuclear test. The report could not be independently confirmed.

Ms. Rice, however, said that her Chinese hosts made no mention of any expression of regret by Mr. Kim in his meeting with the envoy from Beijing.

The Bush administration maintains that financial penalties should have no direct relationship with the nuclear talks and has declined to lift the threat of sanctions against some banks that do business with North Korea as the price for resuming negotiations.

It is unclear whether a conditional offer to return to talks will persuade China to reduce pressure on Pyongyang.

At a minimum, President Hu may be eager to show supporters of North Korea in his own country that China has continued to reach out to the North Korea leader and give him ample opportunity to negotiate his way out of the nuclear crisis.

The risk for the United States is that China may soften its stance if it perceives that the Bush administration, rather than Mr. Kim, is throwing up obstacles to resuming talks.

Mr. Kim has pushed to hold one-on-one negotiations with the United States, but the Bush administration has refused to negotiate with North Korea outside the context of six-party talks. China has urged President Bush to authorize bilateral talks, but he has declined to do so.

Even so, Chinese scholars who have held discussions with Chinese leaders on the North Korea situation say that the North’s missile and nuclear tests, which were conducted despite stern and explicit warnings from China, had pushed Beijing to adopt a new and significantly less accommodating approach to managing relations with its neighbor and one-time ally.

China twice backed United Nations sanctions against North Korea and has since then indicated internally that it may be prepared to impose a range of unilateral sanctions if Mr. Kim continues to develop his nuclear program.

The leadership, the scholar said, is prepared to reduce low-cost oil supplies to North Korea in the event that it conducts more nuclear tests or refuses to return to talks, a step that could cripple the country’s already weak economy.

China has also imposed limited restrictions on banking transactions with North Korea, especially in the trading post of Dandong on the North Korean border, bankers there say. Customs inspectors at the border have begun to inspect cargo shipments into and out of North Korea.

Chinese analysts said that they were not surprised that Mr. Kim would seek to blunt international solidarity against him. But they said they doubted he would be prepared to bargain in earnest about dismantling his nuclear program.

"I have to say I am very pessimistic about the prospects for a diplomatic breakthrough," said Zhu Feng, a senior international affairs scholar and arms control expert at Beijing University. "The talks have to be given a chance but I see no signs that Kim has undergone a sudden change of heart."

Mr. Zhu said he also doubts that China has much patience left for inconclusive negotiations or "tricks" that North Korea might play to buy time.

"I don’t think our leaders are prepared to tolerate him much longer," Mr. Zhu said. "My feeling is that they are prepared to implement harsher penalties and will have to proceed with them before long."

    U.S. and China Seek to Resume North Korea Talks, NYT, 20.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/20/world/asia/20cnd-diplo.html?hp&ex=1161403200&en=706acaaa78c313ed&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Bush: U.S. Will Stop N. Korea Nuke Moves

October 19, 2006
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 3:29 a.m. ET
The New York Times

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush said Wednesday the United States would stop North Korea from transferring nuclear weapons to Iran or al-Qaida and that the communist regime would then face ''a grave consequence.''

Bush refused to spell out how the United States would retaliate. ''They'd be held to account,'' the president said in an ABC News interview.

In light of North Korea's Oct. 9 test detonation of a nuclear bomb, Bush warned that any transfer of nuclear material elsewhere in the world by the North would be considered a grave threat to the security of the United States. He previously used ''grave threat'' in relation to Iraq's Saddam Hussein, whose government was toppled in the U.S.-led war in 2003.

''If we get intelligence that they're about to transfer a nuclear weapon, we would stop the transfer, and we would deal with the ships that were taking the -- or the airplane that was dealing with taking the material to somebody,'' the president said.

Asked how he would retaliate, Bush would not be specific, ''You know, I'd just say it's a grave consequence.''

''The leader of North Korea to understand that he'll be held to account. Just like he's being held to account now for having run a test,'' Bush said.

The United States repeatedly has said it does not intend to attack the North. But the Bush administration also has refused to take any military option completely off the table.

Shifting to Iraq, Bush said intensifying violence now might be compared with the Tet offensive in Vietnam beginning in 1968. The Viet Cong and North Vietnamese armies undertook a series of attacks that shook America's confidence about winning the war and eroded political support for President Johnson.

''There's certainly a stepped up level of violence, and we're heading into an election,'' Bush said. But he added, ''My gut tells me that they have all along been trying to inflict enough damage that we'd leave. And the leaders of al-Qaida have made that very clear.''

Bush said al-Qaida was very active in Iraq. ''They are dangerous. They are lethal. They are trying to not only kill American troops, but they're trying to foment sectarian violence.

''They believe that if they can create enough chaos, the American people will grow sick and tired of the Iraqi effort and will cause government to withdraw,'' he said.

The military said Wednesday that 11 U.S. troops died in combat amid a security crackdown in Baghdad, putting October on track to be the deadliest month for American forces since the siege of Fallujah nearly two years ago.

Bush said the news of casualties ''breaks my heart'' but said it is surrender ''if you pull the troops out before the job is done.''

    Bush: U.S. Will Stop N. Korea Nuke Moves, NYT, 19.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Bush-Interview.html

Restraints Fray and Risks Grow as Nuclear Club Gains Members

October 15, 2006
The New York Times
By WILLIAM J. BROAD and DAVID E. SANGER

The declaration last Monday by North Korea that it had conducted a successful atomic test brought to nine the number of nations believed to have nuclear arms. But atomic officials estimate that as many as 40 more countries have the technical skill, and in some cases the required material, to build a bomb.

That ability, coupled with new nuclear threats in Asia and the Middle East, risks a second nuclear age, officials and arms control specialists say, in which nations are more likely to abandon the old restraints against atomic weapons.

The spread of nuclear technology is expected to accelerate as nations redouble their reliance on atomic power. That will give more countries the ability to make reactor fuel, or, with the same equipment and a little more effort, bomb fuel — the hardest part of the arms equation.

Signs of activity abound. Hundreds of companies are now prospecting for uranium where dozens did a few years ago. Argentina, Australia and South Africa are drawing up plans to begin enriching uranium, and other countries are considering doing the same. Egypt is reviving its program to develop nuclear power.

Concern about the situation led the International Atomic Energy Agency to summon hundreds of government officials and experts from around the world to Vienna in September to discuss tightening restrictions on who is permitted to produce nuclear fuel.

“These dangers are urgent,” Sam Nunn, an expert on nuclear proliferation and a former Democratic senator, told the group. “We are in a race between cooperation and catastrophe and, at this moment, the outcome is unclear.”

But even the atomic agency itself exemplifies some of the underlying tensions inherent in the development of nuclear energy.

For decades, the I.A.E.A., known as the world’s nuclear policeman, has pursued its other mandate — to promote safe nuclear power — by running technical aid programs with roughly a hundred states. Some of that knowledge could be useful in a weapons program, though the aid is meant exclusively for civilian use.

The agency still helps Pakistan, which exploded a nuclear bomb in 1998. It also helped North Korea until a decade ago. Even today, it is assisting Iran, which many experts fear is close to mastering the basics of making a bomb. It has 14 programs under way with Iran, including a study on upgrading a nuclear research laboratory, as well as helping it start up its Bushehr reactor.

North Korea’s reported test has shaken the nuclear status quo and raised anew the question of whether Asia will be the first to feel a nuclear “domino effect,” in which states clandestinely hedge their bets by assembling the crucial technologies needed to make a bomb, or actually cross the line to become new weapons states. In the Middle East, the confrontation with Iran has focused new attention on countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt, both of which fear that an Iranian bomb would make Tehran the greatest power in the region.

Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the I.A.E.A., has estimated that up to 49 nations now know how to make nuclear arms, and he has warned that global tensions could push some over the line.

“We are relying,” he said, “primarily on the continued good intentions of these countries — intentions which are in turn based on their sense of security or insecurity, and could therefore be subject to rapid change.”

Worry about proliferation is hardly new. In March 1963, President John F. Kennedy said, “I am haunted by the feeling that by 1970, unless we are successful, there may be 10 nuclear powers instead of 4, and by 1975, 15 or 20.” That timetable proved to be inaccurate. But in recent years there has been a sense around the globe that President Kennedy’s prediction is about to come true, three decades late.

Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary general, said this year that “the international community seems almost to be sleepwalking” down a path where states, after long living without nuclear arms, now feel compelled to revisit their logic.

He warned of a new arms race — not one of superpowers, but of regional powers. “Perhaps most damaging of all,” he concluded, “there is also a perception that the possession of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction offers the best protection against being attacked.”

A New Nuclear Vision

Democrats and Republicans spent the past week arguing over who lost control of North Korea, Bill Clinton or George W. Bush. But seeds of the problem were planted by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, just months after the armistice ended the fighting on the Korean Peninsula in 1953.

“It is not enough to take this weapon out of the hands of soldiers,” President Eisenhower told the United Nations that year, just as his administration was completing a series of 11 nuclear tests. “It must be put in the hands of those who will know how to strip its military casing and adapt it to the arts of peace.”

His program was called Atoms for Peace, and soon involved dozens of nations, all seeking to unlock the magic of nuclear power. The first generation of nuclear reactors sprang up around the globe, as did a huge supporting industry and an international overseer, the I.A.E.A.

But almost from the start, evidence accumulated that countries were using the civil alliances and reactor technologies to make bombs. By 1960, France had joined the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union as a nuclear weapons state. China conducted its first test in 1964. Israel had the bomb by 1967, India by 1974, South Africa by 1982 (it has since given up its weapons) and Pakistan by 1998.

All but the original three built their weapons by exploiting at least some technologies that were ostensibly civilian, nuclear analysts say. They enriched uranium beyond the low level needed for power reactors. Or they mined the spent fuel of civil reactors for plutonium — the path that North Korea started taking in the late 1980’s or early 1990’s, according to American intelligence officials.

The international atomic agency, which still inscribes Atoms for Peace on its business cards, has worked hard to fight this kind of cheating while also helping with the basic technology. In the 1980’s, it aided Iran’s hunt for uranium.

Even today, Iranian technicians fly to Vienna and agency experts go to Iran to lend a hand. In August, two experts went to review progress at the Bushehr reactor, which is scheduled to go critical next year.

“It’s helping establish that the plant is run in a safe and secure manner, which is in everybody’s interest,” said M. Peter Salema, an agency official. “Look at Chernobyl. That’s the whole point.”

Many of the agency’s cooperative projects use nuclear science to humanitarian ends, like fighting disease and treating cancer. But others involve more basic atomic skills.

“We provide expert services,” Dr. Salema said, “so they can learn to do things for themselves.”

The Technology Boom

The Manhattan project scientists who built the first atom bomb predicted that the diffusion of their secret knowledge was inevitable. It was just a question of time. Now, after decades of scholarly digging, government declassification, open research in uranium and plutonium metallurgy and the rise of the Internet, much of that information is freely available.

“The general concepts are widely known,” said Robert S. Norris, the author of “Racing for the Bomb.” “Still, it’s another thing to actually do it. That still requires certain skills of engineering and chemistry and physics.”

The hardest part, experts agree, is not acquiring the weapons blueprints but obtaining the fuel. That is becoming easier because of developments both overt and covert.

Abdul Qadeer Khan, a chief architect of Pakistan’s nuclear arms program who went on to establish the world’s largest atomic black market, sold the secrets of how to make centrifuges for enriching uranium to Libya, Iran and North Korea. Tehran insists its intentions are entirely peaceful, though most analysts judge that all three countries bought from the black market because they wanted to make nuclear arms.

Dr. Khan sold plans and parts for Pakistan’s first-generation centrifuge, the P-1, as well as the next generation, the P-2, which can spin faster to enrich uranium more rapidly.

Investigators are still trying to learn where else Dr. Khan may have planted his nuclear seeds. They discovered outposts of his network in Dubai, Malaysia and South Africa and found that before his downfall in 2004 he visited at least 18 countries, including Egypt, Niger, Nigeria, Sudan, Syria and Saudi Arabia.

The worrisome enrichment trends involve not just stealthy military advances but also soaring demands for nuclear power, driven by rising populations, dwindling oil supplies and fears that the combustion of fossil fuels is warming the planet.

“The nuclear renaissance is gaining momentum,” said George B. Assie, vice president for business development at Cameco, the world’s largest publicly traded uranium company, based in Canada.

In London, the World Nuclear Association says 28 new reactors are under construction, 62 planned, and 160 proposed, most in Asia. The required uranium, it estimates, could run to more than 65,000 tons.

While it is not clear if the expansion of the world’s civilian atomic infrastructure will ultimately lead to a rise in the number of countries building nuclear arms, it could give more countries the means to do so.

There are two main ways to turn civilian technology to military use. The first is to enrich uranium fuel from its usual level of 5 percent for reactors to the 90 percent needed for a bomb, a modest step that requires longer processing in centrifuges. The second is to take spent reactor fuel and mine it for plutonium, the other main fuel for a bomb.

The Brazilian military, for example, worked hard for decades to develop centrifuges to enrich uranium fuel for a bomb, a secret program it renounced in the 1990’s.

In May, Brazil, despite growing pressure to give up indigenous production, inaugurated its first uranium enrichment plant — an assembly of advanced centrifuges in Resende, in the state of Rio de Janeiro. While Iran has aroused global suspicions for erecting a similar plant, Brazil managed to reassure other nations, and the international atomic agency, that its aims are peaceful.

“We have an urgent need to expand the electric system,” said Leonam dos Santos Guimarães, an official of Electronuclear, which operates nuclear power plants in Brazil.

Forecasting the size of the revitalized global industry is difficult. Even so, the predictions can be staggering. Hans-Holger Rogner, an economist at the international atomic agency, said that many forecasts for the 21st century foresaw huge expansions beyond the 443 power reactors now operating globally.

“An increase to 5,000 reactors is well within the range of many of the longer-range studies,” Dr. Rogner said, adding: “People are positioning themselves. There seems to be a race coming and nobody wants to be left out.”

A Complex Game

A day after North Korea’s nuclear test, Japan’s new prime minister, Shinzo Abe, vowed not to abandon Japan’s commitment to reject and never possess nuclear weapons, a cornerstone of Japanese foreign policy since Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

But, even so, Japan already has all the component parts. It has many tons of plutonium left over from the operation of its reactors, according to a 2004 government report to the I.A.E.A. A small nuclear warhead requires only 10 pounds.

Japan is the ultimate example of a “nuclear option” state, a country that the world knows could become an atomic power virtually overnight, if need be. “They could be very far down the road toward a virtual deterrent and not be in violation of any of the existing international treaties,” said Robert L. Gallucci, the former chief American negotiator with North Korea, and now dean of Georgetown University’s school of foreign service.

South Korea has also vowed not to pursue nuclear weapons. But it has an extensive network of nuclear power reactors and a few years ago, I.A.E.A. inspectors found evidence of undeclared experimentation to make highly enriched uranium. In the early 1990’s, South Korea signed an agreement to keep the Korean Peninsula nuclear-free — but it signed the accord with North Korea.

Iran’s nuclear rise has prompted concerns that the Middle East could experience similar pressures. In the region, only Israel is believed to possess nuclear arms, although it has never confirmed that. If Iran — a Shiite state — does indeed build nuclear weapons, there are fears that Sunni powers like Saudi Arabia or Egypt will be tempted to make their own bombs.

Egypt, which long ago sought to build nuclear arms, may be starting to rethink its earlier renunciation. The 1998 nuclear tests by India and Pakistan shook Cairo. “Egypt’s leaders had placed their bet clearly in favor of the Middle East and the world moving away from nuclear weapons,” said Robert J. Einhorn, a former senior State Department nonproliferation official. “But here was a disquieting indication that movement might be in the opposite direction.”

Recently, the international atomic agency found that Egypt had kept some of its old and new efforts cloaked in secrecy, including a continuing project to acquire uranium ore in the Sinai desert. In September, Cairo announced plans to revive its stalled program to build reactors for generating nuclear power. It gave no sign of whether it, like Iran, planned to make reactor fuel on its own.

So the question now is whether North Korea’s test, and Iran’s challenge, will change the calculus. “When additional countries get the bomb, it does create new pressures,” said Matthew Bunn of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, who tracks the spread of nuclear technology. “But each country is unique and there’s little risk that the dominoes will fall quickly, especially if we take steps to prevent it.”

New Ground Rules

When atomic specialists gathered in Vienna in September to discuss new ground rules for a second nuclear age, their proceedings were fueled by the fear that some of the old restraints — both technological and political — are fraying.

The central proposal debated at the I.A.E.A.’s headquarters sounded simple: No longer should nations be permitted to develop their own means of enriching uranium to make reactor fuel, which Iran and other developing states have claimed as their inalienable right under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Nearly 40 years after the treaty was drafted, the dangers simply seem too great.

Instead, the argument went, nations should band together to make multinational fuel banks where they could watch one another, making sure no fuel is diverted for bomb production.

“A threat exists,” said Sergei Kirienko, director of the Russian Federal Atomic Energy Agency. “We understand that only those solutions that are resolved together, that ensure access for all nations today, will be successful.”

Russia took the lead, proposing an international fuel bank that it would set up on its own soil by next year — and from which it could potentially extract billions of dollars in sales. But the big splash came when Warren E. Buffett, the billionaire philanthropist, pledged $50 million for a fuel bank to be run by the I.A.E.A., making the United Nations body a “supplier of last resort” for any country that forsakes making its own fuel. The Bush administration has backed similar plans.

But while there is agreement on the problem, solutions bogged down in bickering — from weapons states that want to maintain their capacity and from developing nations that sniff a conspiracy to deny them the same nuclear rights that large powers have long enjoyed.

“We should guard against the notion that sensitive technologies are safe in the hands of some, but pose a risk when others have access to them,” said Buyelwa Sonjica, the energy minister of South Africa, which wants to restart its enrichment program and build up to six reactors.

Few parties involved in the debate are optimistic about reform, and some say the enterprise is doomed to failure.

“Nuclear power is inextricably linked with nuclear proliferation,” the environmental group Greenpeace said in a recent statement. “None of the schemes being promoted will solve this problem. In fact, they will make it worse.”

So far, though, the countries that the world most wants to stop from enriching say they have seen no reason to do so.

At a dinner in New York in September, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran looked supremely confident as he batted away the idea that other countries could be relied upon to provide him with the nuclear fuel he said he needed.

“Before stopping enrichment by others, why don’t you stop building the next generation of nuclear weapons?” he asked his American hosts. Then, smiling, he suggested that the United States just buy its nuclear fuel from Iran’s new facilities. He would sell it to Washington, he said, “with a 50 percent discount.”

    Restraints Fray and Risks Grow as Nuclear Club Gains Members, NYT, 15.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/15/world/asia/15nuke.html?hp&ex=1160971200&en=2be24775f27f230e&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Security Council Backs Sanctions on North Korea

October 15, 2006
The New York Times
By WARREN HOGE

UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 14 — The Security Council voted unanimously on Saturday to impose strict sanctions on North Korea for its reported nuclear test, overcoming objections from Russia and China by explicitly excluding the threat of military force.

The resolution, drafted by the United States, clears the way for the toughest international action against North Korea since the end of the Korean War. Primarily, it bars the sale or transfer of material that could be used to make nuclear, biological and chemical weapons or ballistic missiles, and it bans international travel and freezes the overseas assets of people associated with the North’s weapons programs.

In its most debated clause, the resolution authorizes all countries to inspect cargo going in and out of North Korea to detect illicit weapons.

That power was the sticking point in days of what the Russian ambassador called “tense negotiations” with China and Russia that continued up until minutes before the final vote Saturday afternoon. And less than an hour after joining in the Council vote for the resolution, the Chinese ambassador, Wang Guangya, said China would not participate in the inspection regime because it would create “conflict that could have serious implications for the region.”

He said China supported the resolution as a necessary way to respond to Pyongyang’s “flagrant” behavior.

The 15-0 vote came days after North Korea’s claim it had tested a nuclear device, reflecting the immediate global alarm that such a weapon could wind up in the hands of terrorists or other rogue states. Indeed, the resolution’s wording hit most of the tough points the United States and Japan, in particular, had sought.

But China’s refusal to take part in searches, and Russia’s seeming annoyance at the end of the process, immediately raised questions about how effective the resolution’s execution could be. And it raised the prospect, too, that similar action sought by the United States against Iran could face a much tougher battle.

After the vote, John R. Bolton, the American ambassador, insisted that China was bound by the resolution’s terms and would have to find a way to comply with the inspection provision. “I can’t believe that China won’t adhere to obligations that the Security Council has imposed,” he said.

Ambassador Pak Gil-yon of North Korea told the Council that his government “totally rejected” the resolution, and he accused the panel’s members of “gangster-like” action and a “double standards” attitude that neglected the nuclear threat posed by the United States.

He said if the United States continued to “increase pressure” on North Korea, his government would consider it a declaration of war and take “critical countermeasures.” He then rose from his guest seat at the end of the horseshoe-shaped table and left.

Mr. Bolton asked to be heard and pointed to the empty chair, saying Mr. Pak’s impulsive departure was the equivalent of Khrushchev’s pounding his desk in protest in the General Assembly. The Russian ambassador, Vitaly I. Churkin, complained that the reference, even at a moment that he described as Mr. Bolton’s “emotional state,” was “an inappropriate analogy.”

Current and former Bush administration officials, and experts on the North, said that while the sanctions did not go as far as Washington wished, they probably gave it and Japan the legal means to squeeze the country. They provide the basis to inspect ships in ports around the world — though not necessarily on the high seas — and gives Washington a way to expand a program to force banks to halt dealings with the country.

Earlier this year, Stephen J. Hadley, the national security adviser, said that the huge pressure put on one small bank in Macao, Banco Delta Asia, “was the first thing we ever did that got their attention.” Today one of his aides said, “Our plan is that Banco Delta is just a beginning.”

What the administration did not get was authority to use military force to stop ships in international waters. To win over China, it agreed to drop explicit reference to a chapter of the United Nations Charter that authorizes the possible use of military power to enforce sanctions.

“This isn’t going to be like the Cuban missile crisis, where we put up a full blockade,” said Michael Green, who led Asia operations on the National Security Council staff until last year, and is now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The big loophole concerns policing the North’s border with China. The two countries had about $1.7 billion in trade last year. The Chinese declaration Saturday cast doubt on the likelihood that China would inspect, much less stop, much of the trade moving across that border.

Speaking Saturday outside the White House, President Bush said the resolution sent “a clear message to the leader of North Korea regarding his weapons programs. This action by the United Nations, which was swift and tough, says that we are united in our determination to see to it that the Korea Peninsula is nuclear-weapons-free.”

In addition to the sanctions and search regime, the resolution demands that North Korea abandon its illicit weapons programs and rejoin the nonproliferation treaty, and it calls on the government to return to the so-called six-nation talks involving South Korea, Japan, China, Russia and the United States.

[On Sunday, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Aleksandr Y. Alekseyev, who arrived in Beijing following talks in North Korea, said, “Several times the North Korean side returned to the question that the six-sided process should continue, that they have not rejected the six-sided negotiations and that the goal of the six-sided negotiations — the full denuclearization of the Korean peninsula — remains,” according to the official Russian Information Agency.]

A ban on the shipment of luxury goods in the resolution was particularly championed by Mr. Bolton and J. D. Crouch, the deputy national security adviser, as a way to harm the North’s leader, Kim Jong-il, administration officials said. Mr. Kim does not command the kind of loyalty that his father, Kim Il-sung, the country’s father and “Great Leader,” did until his death in 1994. So instead, according to North Korean defectors, he buys allegiance with Mercedes-Benz cars, bottles of cognac and plenty of walking-around money.

Mr. Bolton alluded to that this week when he said that one intent of the resolution was to put Mr. Kim, who presides over a starving country but travels on luxurious train cars, on a diet. He said that the resolution left Pyongyang “utterly and totally isolated” and that the government should see its only way back to international acceptance was “abandoning weapons of mass destruction and not continuing to go after them.”

Mr. Bolton said the measure was aimed at illicit activities of Pyongyang like “money laundering, counterfeiting and selling of narcotics.” Those words, however, were removed to gain Chinese and Russian approval. The final draft also dropped a broad arms embargo in favor of one just on heavy equipment like battle tanks, artillery systems, missiles and warships.

Despite the changes, Mr. Bolton said, “We think this represents essentially what the United States was asking for when it circulated its draft resolution on Monday.”

Asked about the effect of Saturday’s decision on the debate expected next week over sanctions on Iran for its refusal to suspend its nuclear program, he said, “I think this shows quite strongly that the Council is not going to tolerate proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and Iran should learn from this lesson.”

But Mr. Churkin, the Russian ambassador, signaled that an obstacle in the talks over North Korea would also arise in the Iran debate, where Russia and China have also been reluctant to back direct punishments.

Noting that in the cases of both North Korea and Iran, the United States had imposed its own sanctions, he said, “It is unhealthy that when discussing collective measures and trying to be cooperative and forming a unified approach, one country comes out and adopts unilateral measures which also apply to other countries that are participating in the discussion.”

He said, “We very much hope that our American colleagues understand, in terms of the problems we have to solve and tackle in the next stage of our work in the Security Council.”

David E. Sanger contributed reporting from Washington.

    Security Council Backs Sanctions on North Korea, NYT, 15.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/15/world/asia/15nations.html?hp&ex=1160971200&en=2b9b22d53b3716c8&ei=5094&partner=homepage

U.S. Hits Obstacle in Getting a Vote on North Korea

October 14, 2006
The New York Times
By WARREN HOGE

UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 13 — The United States pressed for a Saturday vote on a Security Council resolution that would impose sanctions on North Korea for its reported nuclear test, but questions from China and Russia on Friday evening cast the timing and possibly the content of the document into doubt.

The terms of the resolution had already been softened three times this week to meet objections from China and Russia, and earlier Friday there appeared to be agreement on holding a vote Saturday morning.

John R. Bolton, the American ambassador to the United Nations, said the new problems appeared “technical” rather than “substantial,” but said they would require another conference of Japan and the five permanent Council members, Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States, Saturday before the full 15-member panel met later in the day.

While the wording of the resolution was still being worked out, American intelligence officials said on Friday evening that they had found radioactive material in air samples taken over the region, providing more evidence that North Korea did indeed detonate a nuclear bomb. [Page A7.]

The new draft resolution dropped or softened several provisions to placate China and Russia. It eliminated explicit mention of military enforcement of the sanctions; placed more limits on the kinds of cargo that could be inspected going in and out of North Korea; and dropped a blanket embargo on conventional weapons.

Mr. Bolton indicated that one area of dispute remained the methods and legalities of how to inspect cargo. The new draft resolution limits the weapons ban to large-size arms, military systems and unconventional weapons.

The measure, drafted by the United States, still requires all countries to prevent the sale or transfer of material related to North Korea’s nuclear, ballistic missile and unconventional weapons programs, and maintains a ban on travel by persons associated with those programs.

It also bars North Korea from exporting such weapons, a provision aimed at the international concern over the possibility of unconventional arms from North Korea ending up with terrorist groups or rogue states.

Kenzo Oshima, the Japanese ambassador to the United Nations and president of the Security Council, announced the Council would gather at noon, but could not say whether there would be a vote.

“An overwhelming majority of the Council members want to vote as soon as possible,” Mr. Bolton said. “They still think it is important to send a swift and strong signal, and I’m confident we’re going to be able to do that.”

Wang Guangya, the Chinese ambassador, said, “It all depends on the final text, because we are not at the final text yet.”

The United States and Japan, the driving forces behind the resolution, had earlier thought they had surmounted the Chinese and Russian objections to the resolution when they submitted a revision Thursday night that softened some of the earlier provisions.

Mr. Bolton said the United States was “very satisfied” with the document as it stood Friday morning and was prepared to vote for it immediately.

But Mr. Wang, while asserting his country was happy with the progress that had been made, said his country was still studying the text before officially pronouncing on it. “With progress we are always satisfied, but if we work harder, we might make more progress,” he said.

Vitaly I. Churkin, the Russian ambassador, said, “I think we are on the right track, but we are not there yet.”

In Washington, officials, apparently confident of the imminent passage of the measure, announced that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would travel to Asia next week to discuss how to implement the resolution, as well as to discuss other efforts to deter North Korean proliferation of a nuclear bomb or bomb-making materials. Sean McCormack, the State Department spokesman, said Ms. Rice would travel to Tokyo, Seoul and Beijing.

The trip, he said, is “an opportunity for her in the region to reaffirm and talk about the strength of our existing alliances there, and also to have a bit more of a wider conversation with others in the region about the current situation, about the security situation, and also to talk broadly about nonproliferation efforts.”

Senior State Department officials portrayed the United Nations momentum toward a resolution as evidence of a united, multilateral front agreeing to punish North Korea.

“So the first issue we need to do is to make clear that the sense of outrage and condemnation by the international community to have a resolution in the Security Council, which will not only be a resolution condemning North Korea, but actually a resolution with some teeth to it,” said Christopher Hill, the assistant secretary of state for east Asian and Pacific affairs.

“North Korea needs to understand that this is indeed a very, very costly decision that will leave North Korea far worse off and far more isolated than ever before,” said Mr. Hill, speaking at a conference in Washington. “We need to give that message very clearly and make sure that North Korea cannot find any differences in our views. So I think so far, so good.”

The resolution condemns the test on Oct. 9 as a “flagrant disregard” of Security Council warnings, orders it not to conduct nuclear or missile tests, and urges the North to return to six-nation talks with South Korea, China, Japan, Russia and the United States.

It freezes funds overseas of people or businesses connected to the unconventional weapons programs and bans the sale of luxury goods to North Korea.

“I think the North Korean population has been losing height and weight over the years,” Mr. Bolton said. “Maybe this will be a little diet for Kim Jong-il,” he said, referring to the North Korean dictator.

Under the resolution, member states are to report to the Security Council within 30 days on steps they have taken to comply with the its demands.

The resolution still invokes Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, which makes mandatory economic and diplomatic sanctions. China and Russia customarily resist the Chapter VII provision on the grounds that it sets a pretext for the use of military force, as many countries believe it did in Iraq.

But in a formulation used in July to obtain a unanimous vote on the resolution condemning the North Korean missile launches, the text added a reference to Article 41 of the chapter, which permits only “means not involving the use of military force.”

In another change designed to gain Chinese and Russian support, the resolution now says the inspection process will be “cooperative” with local authorities. Both countries were sensitive to such interdiction being done near their coasts and borders, but Mr. Bolton said that though the inspections covered air, sea and land shipments, he expected most actions would be performed in port.

As for the agreement struck to limit the arms embargo to specific weapons like missiles, tanks, attack helicopters, artillery systems, warships and combat aircraft, Mr. Bolton said, “That would place under embargo the most dangerous, most sophisticated, most lethal weapons, so that’s a substantial step forward, and, as I say, we’re happy to accept that as a compromise.”

    U.S. Hits Obstacle in Getting a Vote on North Korea, NYT, 14.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/14/world/asia/14nations.html?hp&ex=1160884800&en=0ffd2d81eface946&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Making Good on Bush’s Vow Will Require Detective Work

October 13, 2006
The New York Times
By THOM SHANKER and DAVID E. SANGER

WASHINGTON, Oct. 12 — Making good on President Bush’s vow this week to hold North Korea “fully accountable” if it shares nuclear material will pose a major challenge to American intelligence and diplomacy, requiring new equipment and a high level of international cooperation, administration and military officials say.

Mr. Bush’s declaration on Monday, in his first public comments after the North announced that it had detonated a nuclear device, underscored the importance of monitoring North Korea’s nuclear program, tracking its exports and investing in technology for “fingerprinting” nuclear materials.

Security specialists said Mr. Bush’s warning signaled a significant expansion of longstanding policies of deterrence, extending the threat of reprisals to the transfer of nuclear weapons or materials to another country or to terrorists.

That has long been a concern about the North Korean program, but the tools to prevent it are still limited.

Robert Joseph, the under secretary of state for arms control and international security, said in an interview on Thursday that “to be credible, declaratory policy must be backed up by effective capabilities.”

Mr. Joseph cited three existing programs as models for what was needed: the Proliferation Security Initiative, a loose grouping of dozens of countries that have agreed to intercept illicit arms shipments moving through their waters or airspace; Megaports, an effort to install radiation detectors at major cargo ports around the world; and Second Line of Defense, a program to place radiation detectors at major border crossings around the world.

“We are putting in place the ability to detect, disrupt and deter North Korean proliferation activities,” he said. “The announced North Korean nuclear test will provide impetus to further expand these capabilities, particularly in Asia.”

The Pentagon, in carrying out one of its most sensitive missions, maintains a team of nuclear experts to analyze the fallout from any nuclear attack by terrorists, not only to identify the attackers but also to figure out where they got their bomb.

Separately, the International Atomic Energy Agency, a United Nations unit based in Vienna, compiles identifying markers drawn from the chemistry and physics of processes that produce radioactive material in nuclear programs around the world.

Using that kind of data and technology, it might be possible to figure out the likely origin of an intercepted shipment of bomb material — or of the radioactive debris of a weapon that was used. The atomic energy agency’s inspectors have significant records from their time in North Korea before they were expelled, and they could rule out many other possible sources of radioactive material by calling on records from nations that cooperate with the agency.

The real question is how best to head off a nuclear transfer in the first place. Those options include stiff embargos, like those under discussion at the United Nations or even a more muscular international air and maritime inspection operation.

And then there is the threat of harsh retaliation.

Mr. Bush’s declaration on Monday was no strategic aside, a number of administration and military officials said. Mr. Bush consciously chose language that amounts to a new “declaratory policy” of a line that must not be crossed.

“The transfer of nuclear weapons or material by North Korea to states or nonstate entities would be considered a grave threat to the United States, and we would hold North Korea fully accountable of the consequences of such action,” Mr. Bush said.

When pressed for details on the implications, a range of administration and military officials declined to elaborate, saying that part of the power of deterrence was its very ambiguity. Most would speak about the topic only on condition of anonymity.

“These declarations are constructed with some elasticity, specifically to raise questions and doubts in the mind of the object,” one Bush administration official said.

Last year the White House ordered a study of whether North Korea might share some nuclear fuel with Iran, but the report was inconclusive.

Some administration officials say they doubt that the North Koreans would take the risk. Others, including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, argue that the North’s record indicates that it proliferates any weapon in its arsenal. For example, it has long supplied missiles to Iran, and there have been suspicions, but no evidence, of nuclear cooperation between the countries as well.

Mr. Bush’s statement was viewed by national security experts as a major shift in deterrence doctrine, one that acknowledges that the mission today is no longer preventing North Korea from building a nuclear weapon, but deterring its use or transfer.

“The administration will continue saying that a nuclear weapon in North Korea is unacceptable, but in fact they are beginning to accept it,” said Scott D. Sagan, director of Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation. “The administration is switching from a nonproliferation policy to a deterrence and defense policy. It is a form of containment rather than a form of nonproliferation.”

The considerations during the cold war were far more straightforward: a Soviet missile would leave an obvious return address, allowing the United States to respond with no doubt as to the source of the attack.

But getting from the presumption of North Korean proliferation to the evidence is a very difficult task, one that initially is an intelligence, not a military, effort.

The difficulties of turning Mr. Bush’s vow into real deterrence were vividly demonstrated in late 2003, the only moment when North Korea was widely suspected of being the source of nuclear material found elsewhere in the world.

The discovery was made in Libya, which decided to give up its nuclear weapons program. Along with centrifuges and other equipment purchased from the black market network created by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani nuclear engineer, the Libyans turned over a cask of nearly two tons of uranium. It had arrived in Tripoli around 2001 in a semiprocessed form: uranium hexafluoride, the gas that is poured into centrifuges for enrichment into nuclear fuel.

Korean markings on the cask suggested that the North was the source. And chemical traces on the outside of the cask proved that the container had been at North Korea’s main nuclear site, Yongbyon.

But while the Bush administration at first charged that North Korea had been the source of Libya’s uranium, experts spent months trying to determine whether the contents of the cask had come from there as well or whether it had been filled up elsewhere. The result: plenty of suspicions, but no hard proof.

“We took months and months and months and still couldn’t come to a 100 percent conclusion,” one senior administration official said this year. “That happens. But it doesn’t help you justify a counterstrike against someone.”

The president’s new warning grows from his 2002 National Security Strategy and subsequent statements on deterrence and pre-emption. But until now he never specifically said a nation transferring nuclear weapons or components would be held liable and be subject to retaliation, according to administration officials and analysts in the academic community.

    Making Good on Bush’s Vow Will Require Detective Work, NYT, 13.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/13/world/asia/13trace.html?hp&ex=1160798400&en=797cec9e5a9a1ebf&ei=5094&partner=homepage

U.S. Softens Proposal on North Korea

October 12, 2006
The New York Times
By JOHN O’NEIL and CHOE SANG-HUN

The United Nations Security Council today took up a softened American proposal for sanctions over North Korea’s reported nuclear test, but its prospects were clouded when China appeared to pull back from its earlier support for tough measures.

In Washington, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Stephen Hadley, the national security adviser, met with a senior Chinese diplomat, Tang Jiaxuan, to discuss North Korea, Reuters reported. A spokesman for the National Security Council, Frederick Jones, said the group talked about “the way forward in dealing with North Korea.”

The new American resolution, to be formally introduced this morning, would declare North Korea’s actions to be a threat to international peace and stability and would require countries to freeze assets related to Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs and ban the sale or transfer of materials that could be used in them. It would also ban travel by people involved in the programs and bar the sale of the luxury goods used to reward the regime’s elite, diplomats said late Wednesday.

But unlike an earlier version, it would allow but not require inspections of all cargo going into or out of North Korea, or the freezing of assets related to counterfeiting or narcotics, which American officials say are crucial sources of the hard currency needed to fund the weapons programs. Japanese demands for a ban on allowing North Korean ships or planes to enter other countries were also dropped.

In Beijing today, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry appeared to back away from a statement on Tuesday by the country’s United Nations ambassador expressing support for “punitive” sanctions.

“It’s necessary to express clearly to North Korea that the nuclear test is the wrong practice,” said the spokesman, Liu Jianchao. “As to what measures to take, I think the measures themselves are not punitive action,” he said. “One can say that punishment isn’t the goal.”

In South Korea today, a bitter political dispute erupted over how to respond to the nuclear test. South Korea and China, which provide the North with large amounts of aid and are its only significant trading partners, are the only countries in a position to exert significant financial pressure on Pyongyang.

Without their active participation, sanctions will be limited in their impact, analysts say. But the division at home leaves President Roh Moo Hyun of South Korea without a consensus as he prepares to meet the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, in Beijing on Friday.

After days of squabbling, the South Korean Parliament today passed a resolution condemning North Korea’s nuclear test. But some governing party lawmakers criticized the resolution because it did not mention American “responsibility” for the crisis.

The main opposition Grand National Party was also unhappy; it issued a separate statement demanding an end to two joint projects with the North — the Diamond Mountain tourism project, for which South Korea has provided the North with over $900 million since 1998, and an industrial complex in Kaesong, where South Korean factories produce garments and kitchen utensils with cheap North Korean labor.

At the same time, a top governing party leader in South Korea warned against joining the American-led Proliferation Security Initiative, which aims to intercept North Korean ships suspected of carrying weapons materials.

Seoul’s participation in the initiative “could work as a detonator for a military clash,” the leader, Kim Keun Tae, said at a meeting with cabinet ministers.

And in another sign of a gap between Seoul and Washington, Lee Jong Seok, the South Korean cabinet minister in charge of relations with North Korea, told Parliament today that negotiations, as well as sanctions, were needed because “North Korea is not a country that one can open up with pressure and sanctions alone.”

Seoul’s inability to make a quick decision, which stands in sharp contrast to Japan’s swift ban on imports and ships from North Korea, reflects a divide among South Koreans over how to reconcile their so-called Sunshine Policy of engaging North Korea with the American push for an economic blockade on the North.

A North Korean official warned Japan today that the regime would take “strong countermeasures” if Tokyo went ahead with the tough unilateral sanctions on the North it announced late Wednesday.

”The specific contents will become clear if you keep watching,” Song Il Ho, the North Korean ambassador in charge of relations with Japan, told the Kyodo news agency in Pyongyang. “We never speak empty words.”

North Korea rattled the Japanese in 1998 by firing a missile that flew over Japan and crashed in the Pacific.

In New York on Wednesday, John R. Bolton, America’s ambassador to the United Nations, said that he hoped for a vote on the draft by Friday.

“There are still a lot of comments that have been made and areas of disagreement, but as we have said repeatedly, we think this requires a strong and swift response,” Mr. Bolton said.

The new American draft still invokes Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter. But the Chinese ambassador to the United Nations in New York, Wang Guangya, said on Wednesday that Beijing wanted to restrict the reference to Chapter 7 to its Article 41, which provides for economic penalties, severance of diplomatic relations or the banning of air travel, but not military measures. China also reportedly wants the scope of sanctions to be focused more narrowly.

John O’Neil reported from New York and Choe Sang-Hun from Seoul. Warren Hoge contributed reporting from New York.

    U.S. Softens Proposal on North Korea, NYT, 12.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/12/world/asia/13koreacnd.html?hp&ex=1160712000&en=0920b65f4a0cc702&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Border fence to complicate US-Mexico ties: Calderon

Thu Oct 12, 2006 4:38 AM ET
Reuters

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A U.S.-Mexico border fence aimed at keeping illegal immigrants out of the United States will "enormously complicate" relations between the countries, Mexican president-elect Felipe Calderon said on Wednesday.

President Bush signed a law last week that will pay for hundreds of miles of new fences along the border, a move against illegal immigration that Republicans had sought before next month's congressional elections.

Mexicans are livid about the plan, which is seen as a slap in the face to efforts during President Vicente Fox's near-completed six-year term to come to an agreement with Washington on immigration.

"It is going to be a very difficult relationship," Calderon, who takes over from Fox on December 1, said in a television interview of U.S.-Mexico diplomacy during his upcoming administration.

"This fence they are leaving me is going to enormously complicate relations with the United States."

Conservative ruling party candidate Calderon's victory over leftist firebrand Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in the July 2 election was seen as a foreign relations boost for Washington in Latin America, where anti-U.S. sentiment is high in some countries.

    Border fence to complicate US-Mexico ties: Calderon, R, 12.10.2006, http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=politicsNews&storyID=2006-10-12T083751Z_01_N12174620_RTRUKOC_0_US-USA-MEXICO-CALDERON.xml&WTmodLoc=Home-C5-politicsNews-3

Editorial

The Age of Impunity

October 12, 2006
The New York Times

Sudan’s leaders sent out a letter last week warning governments against volunteering their troops for a United Nations peacekeeping force for Darfur. Khartoum was obviously feeling cocky. But why shouldn’t it? The Security Council — or more to the point, the big powers that run the Security Council — made clear that it won’t send in troops to stop the genocide unless Sudan first agrees.

Then there’s Iran, which is still defiantly enriching uranium. And the North Koreans, who blew off the rest of the world when they blew off what they said was a nuclear weapon this week.

Welcome to the new age of impunity.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. The Iraq war and President Bush’s with-us-or-against-us war on terrorism was supposed to frighten the bad guys so much that they wouldn’t dare cross the United States. But the opposite has happened. President Bush has squandered so much of America’s moral authority — not to mention our military resources — that efforts to shame or bully the right behavior from adversaries (and allies) sound hollow.

There is plenty of blame to go around when it comes to empowering rogue states. The Chinese have been shielding Sudan and North Korea. The Russians have been shielding Iran. Were it not for Iraq and Mr. Bush’s other troubles, there would be ways to shame or bypass those roadblocks. When the Russians blocked U.N. action in Kosovo, President Clinton got NATO to stop the killing.

Mr. Bush appears to care deeply about Darfur. But the United States is so overstretched in Iraq that no one in this White House is even talking about sending NATO to stop ethnic cleansing that has already left more than 200,000 dead and displaced more than two million.

Closing our eyes for another two years isn’t an answer. Washington needs to assert its leadership, no matter how tattered, on all these fronts.

We suspect that cargo inspections and a cutoff of military and luxury trade will not be enough to get North Korea to back down. But having started there, Mr. Bush now needs to tell China and Russia that all future relations will be judged on how they hold the North to account.

Beijing and Moscow would find it harder to say no if Mr. Bush made a clear pledge — no caveats and no fingers crossed behind his back — that he would not try to overthrow North Korea’s government if it abandoned its nuclear weapons. Mr. Bush needs to make the same unambiguous offer to Iran. As for Darfur, Khartoum might feel less cocky if Mr. Bush announced that he was taking the lead on soliciting troops for a peacekeeping force while asking NATO to start drawing up plans for a possible forced entry should the United Nations fail to act.

In his news conference yesterday, Mr. Bush said that the abuses at Abu Ghraib “hurt us internationally. It kind of eased us off the moral high ground.” He quickly added that the world had seen the perpetrators held to account.

We fear it will take a lot more than the trials of a few low-level prison guards to repair the damage, whether from Abu Ghraib, Guantánamo, the secret prisons or the whole mismanaged Iraq war. There can be no impunity at home either.

    The Age of Impunity, NYT, 12.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/12/opinion/12thu1.html

Bush Rejects Idea of Talks With N. Korea

October 12, 2006
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 12:14 a.m. ET
The New York Times

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush unapologetically defended his approach to North Korea's nuclear weapons program Wednesday, pledging he would not change course despite contentions that Pyongyang's apparent atomic test proved the failure of his nearly six years of effort.

Bush rejected the idea of direct U.S.-North Korea talks, saying the Koreans were more likely to listen if confronted with the combined protest of many nations.

The president said he was not backing down from his assertion three years ago that ''we will not tolerate nuclear weapons in North Korea.''

He said the United States ''reserves all options to defend our friends and our interests in the region against the threats from North Korea,'' a stance he said includes increased defense cooperation, especially on missile defense, with Japan and South Korea.

But he added: ''I believe the commander in chief must try all diplomatic measures before we commit our military.''

The president appeared at a news conference in the White House's Rose Garden in an effort to rescue a diplomatic drive to contain North Korea and to rebut charges he had been distracted by the Iraq war from the developing threat in Asia.

Aftershocks of North Korea's claimed nuclear test continued reverberating around the world.

At the United Nations, the United States and Japan pushed China and South Korea to support a sanctions resolution that would deliver what Bush called ''serious repercussions'' for Pyongyang, including cargo inspections.

Japanese officials, fearing for their nation just across the Sea of Japan from North Korea, took action on their own to choke off an economic lifeline for the impoverished communist nation, barring lucrative North Korean imports, most entries into the country by North Koreans and the presence of North Korean ships in Japanese ports.

South Korea, which fought a war with the North in the 1950s and like Japan regards Pyongyang warily, checked its readiness for nuclear warfare. The defense minister said Seoul could expand its conventional arsenal and the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended improved defenses.

North Korea, in its first formal statement since Monday's test announcement, warned that new sanctions would be considered an act of war that would bring unspecified ''physical corresponding measures.''

North Korea's No. 2 leader Kim Yong Nam said more nuclear tests are possible. And while the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas remained calm, North Korean troops tried to provoke guards on the southern side by spitting across the line, making throat-slashing hand gestures and flashing middle fingers, according to a U.S. military spokesman.

In Washington, Democrats contended that Bush has mishandled North Korea by pursuing a strategy that led to a 400 percent increase in the nation's nuclear capabilities under his watch.

''President Bush tries to talk tough, but he doesn't act smart,'' said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. ''He insists on stubbornly following policies that don't work, and it is time for a change.''

William Perry, a defense secretary under former President Clinton, said the U.S. government must abandon its desire for a new government in Pyongyang and agree to direct, one-on-one talks -- even if on the sidelines of long-stalled six-party talks that also include China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.

''Until we make those two steps, we're in a lost cause trying to deal with on North Korea,'' Perry said in a conference call with reporters.

The call for bilateral negotiations was echoed Wednesday by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan from New York. But Bush again rebuffed the idea.

''One has a stronger hand when there's more people playing your same cards,'' he said in an hourlong news conference that was dominated by the North Korean crisis. ''It is much easier for a nation to hear what I believe are legitimate demands if there's more than one voice speaking.''

A day earlier, Republican Sen. John McCain had said Clinton was at fault for failing to take adequate action in the 1990s to stop North Korea from developing nuclear weapons.

Bush gave scant attention to that domestic blame game, repeatedly turning the spotlight back on what he called ''North Korea's provocation.''

He said he learned North Korea can't be trusted from the experience of the Clinton administration's 1994 pact with Pyongyang, which offered energy help in return for a nuclear freeze but which the North secretly defied nearly from the start. He defended his decision to switch nearly immediately to a policy of refusing to talk with North Korea except when other regional players were also at the table.

''I appreciate the efforts of previous administrations. It just didn't work,'' he said.

The president acknowledged the difficulty of persuading nations such as China and South Korea to drop any resistance to a tough crackdown on North Korea by the U.N. Security Council.

''We share the same goal, but sometimes the internal issues are different from ours. And, therefore, it takes a while to get people on the same page. And it takes awhile for people to get used to consequences,'' he said. ''And so I wouldn't necessarily characterize these countries' positions as, you know, locked-in positions.''

The United States and Japan want the Security Council to impose a partial trade embargo, including strict limits on Korea's weapons exports, a freeze of related financial assets and inspections of cargo to and from North Korea. They prefer that the sanctions fall under the portion of the U.N. Charter that gives the council the authority to back up its resolutions with a range of measures that include military action.

China is considered to have the most leverage with North Korea as its top provider of badly needed economic and energy aid. But both Beijing and Seoul worry a hard-line approach could destabilize the North and send refugees flooding over their borders.

''Peace on the Korean Peninsula requires that these nations send a clear message to Pyongyang that its actions will not be tolerated,'' Bush said.

Associated Press writers Hans Greimel in Seoul, South Korea, and Nick Wadhams at the United Nations contributed to this report.

    Bush Rejects Idea of Talks With N. Korea, NYT, 12.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Koreas-Nuclear.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

For Bush, Many Questions on Iraq and North Korea

October 12, 2006
The New York Times
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

WASHINGTON, Oct. 11 — President Bush said Wednesday that he would not use force against North Korea because “diplomacy hasn’t run its course,” but acknowledged that many Americans wonder why he invaded Iraq but has not taken military action to head off North Korea’s race for a bomb.

“I’m asked questions around the country, ‘Just go ahead and use the military,’ ” Mr. Bush said at a morning news conference in the Rose Garden, his first extended question-and-answer session with reporters in the days since North Korea announced it had detonated a nuclear device. “And my answer is that I believe the commander in chief must try all diplomatic measures before we commit our military.”

Then, without prompting, the president asked an obvious next question.

“I’ll ask myself a follow-up,” Mr. Bush said. “ ‘If that’s the case, why did you use military action in Iraq?’ And the reason why is because we tried the diplomacy.”

Mr. Bush’s unusual exchange with himself came during an hourlong news conference dominated by questions about North Korea and Iraq. Democrats have criticized him for rushing into a war with Iraq, which turned out not to have unconventional weapons, while not setting limits on North Korea, which declared this week that it had conducted its first nuclear test.

That the president himself raised and rejected this critique appears to reflect concern among Mr. Bush’s advisers that North Korea could be a political liability for Republicans, one that the president needed to confront directly with voters.

Mr. Bush’s stance was to reassert that the United States would not tolerate a nuclear-armed North Korea, but that the way to shut down its nuclear programs was through multilateral diplomacy, not one-on-one talks or military action.

Intelligence officials have not yet determined the exact size of the device that North Korea tested, or explained why it appeared to have been fairly small, less than a kiloton. Democrats and Republicans have been arguing over who was responsible for the buildup in the North. Madeleine K. Albright, a secretary of state for former President Bill Clinton, issued a statement on Wednesday defending his administration and striking back at Mr. Bush.

“During the two terms of the Clinton administration, there were no nuclear weapons tests by North Korea, no new plutonium production, and no new nuclear weapons developed in Pyongyang,” Ms. Albright’s statement said. “Through our policy of constructive engagement, the world was safer. President Bush chose a different path, and the results are evident for all to see.”

Despite the North’s test, Mr. Bush insisted Wednesday that his diplomatic approach was the best course and that he would continue to seek support for sanctions from other nations. He resisted calls for direct negotiations with North Korea of the sort the Clinton administration had engaged in, saying “the strategy did not work.”

“North Korea has been trying to acquire bombs and weapons for a long period of time,” Mr. Bush said, “long before I came into office.”

On Iraq, Mr. Bush seemed to push back against recent remarks by James A. Baker III, the former secretary of state who is the Republican chairman of a bipartisan panel reassessing Iraq strategy. On Sunday, Mr. Baker suggested that his panel’s report would depart from Mr. Bush’s repeated calls to “stay the course.”

But Mr. Bush signaled that he would not be pressed into a premature withdrawal.

“Stay the course means keep doing what you’re doing,’ ” he said. “My attitude is, don’t do what you’re doing if it’s not working — change. Stay the course also means, don’t leave before the job is done. We’re going to get the job done in Iraq.”

On North Korea, Mr. Bush was asked if he regretted his decision not to take action — military or otherwise — to destroy fuel supplies in 2003, when the North threw out international weapons inspectors, withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and said it would turn its spent nuclear fuel into weapons. At that time, the fuel was all briefly in one known location.

“I used that moment to continue my desire to convince others to become equity partners in the Korean issue,” Mr. Bush said, referring to the so-called six-party talks aimed at persuading the North to give up its nuclear capacity. He added, “I obviously look at all options all the time, and I felt like the best way to solve this problem would be through a diplomacy effort.”

Experts believe the nuclear buildup in the North dates back to the early 1990’s, when the first President Bush was in office. Under an agreement Mr. Clinton struck in 1994, North Korea agreed to freeze its production of plutonium in return for energy aid. North Korea abided by the freeze, but starting around 1997, it took steps on a second, secret nuclear program.

In 2002, after South Korean and American intelligence agencies found conclusive evidence of that program, the Bush administration confronted the North with the evidence that it had cheated while Mr. Clinton was still in office. That led to the six-nation talks, involving the United States, North Korea, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia.

“The Clinton administration was prepared to accept an imperfect agreement in the interest of achieving limits,” said Gary S. Samore, a North Korea expert who helped negotiate the original 1994 agreement. “The Bush administration is not prepared to accept an imperfect agreement, and the result is that we have no limits.”

But Mr. Bush on Wednesday reiterated his stance that it was “unacceptable” for North Korea to have nuclear weapons. Asked if he was “ready to live with a nuclear North Korea,” Mr. Bush gave a one-word answer: “No.”

    For Bush, Many Questions on Iraq and North Korea, NYT, 12.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/12/washington/12prexy.html?hp&ex=1160712000&en=a417871cbb05fea3&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Bush Says No Plans to Attack North Korea

October 11, 2006
The New York Times
By JOHN O’NEIL and CHOE SANG-HUN

President Bush said that he has “no intention” of attacking North Korea, but that the United States is stepping up defense cooperation with the North’s Asian neighbors, after the regime in Pyongyang warned that it will regard increased American pressure from the United States as a “declaration of war” that will be met with “physical measures.”

Appearing in the Rose Garden for an hour-long news conference, Mr. Bush repeated earlier assurances that he will give diplomacy “every opportunity” to resolve the crisis.

But he also said that the United States “also reserves all options to defend our friends and our interests in the region against the threats from North Korea.”

Specifically, he said that he had told the leaders of Japan and South Korea that the United State will honor its security assurances to them, and will increase cooperation on anti-missile defense and on steps to block illegal exports from North Korea of nuclear material or missile technology.

Mr. Bush also defended himself from charges that North Korea’s claimed nuclear test this week was proof that his policy of refusing to hold one-on-one talks with the Pyongyang had failed, as well as questions about whether his earlier declaration that a nuclear North Korea would not be tolerated was an empty threat.

“That statement still stands,” he said.

Mr. Bush blamed the North’s leader, Kim Jong-Il, for “walking away” from an agreement reached last year during six-country talks that could have led to an abandonment of its nuclear program. And he said that while he “appreciated the efforts of previous administrations’’ to rein in North Korea’s nuclear program, their approach “just didn’t work.”

Mr. Bush said that the United Nations Security Council must now require North Korea to abide by what he called “its commitment to dismantle its nuclear program.” He said the council must also take measures to prevent the export of nuclear material by the North and to block financial transfers that help pay for its weapons programs.

While talks on possible U.N. action continued in New York, Japan announced tough new sanctions against the North Korea in response to its claimed nuclear test, barring all North Korean ships, cutting off all imports of goods from North Korea and restrict the flow of travelers between the two countries.

North Korea’s threats come a day after the United States picked up important support from China, North Korea’s closest ally. China said it would support punitive sanctions in response to Sunday’s blast, although not necessarily the specific measures the Bush administration is seeking.

In a statement carried by the official North Korean news agency, the country’s foreign ministry declared today that “if the U.S. keeps pestering us and increases the pressure, we will regard it as a declaration of war and will take a series of physical corresponding measures.”

And in a rare interview, the country’s number two leader, Kim Yong Nam, told a Japanese news agency that president of the Presidium of the North’s legislature, that a continued “hostile attitude” on the part of Washington could prompt more nuclear tests.

“If the United States continues to take a hostile attitude and apply pressure on us in various forms, we will have no choice but to take physical steps to deal with that,” he said.

The statement issued by the foreign ministry said that the country was prepared for dialogue or for confrontation, according to Reuters.

North Korea often issues dire and bellicose statements, and whenever tough sanctions have been proposed has been quick to equate them with an act of war.

But in Seoul, President Roh Moo Hyun told the South Koreans to brace themselves for a “prolonged” confrontation with North Korea.

Mr. Roh also called the North Korean claim that it has built nuclear weapons because of American threats a ``gross exaggeration.”

``The threat to security the North Koreans are talking about is either nonexistent or a gross exaggeration,” he said. ``It’s unclear whether the North Koreans are deliberately exaggerating the threat or they are ignorant.”

The United States, Britain and France all want a resolution drafted under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, which makes sanctions mandatory and poses the possibility of military enforcement.

While both China and Russia have spoken of the importance of taking serious action against North Korea’s reported nuclear test, they are traditionally against invoking Chapter VII and have not indicated whether they would end their opposition. On Tuesday, China said it would support tough action, but it was not clear whether it would go along with the list of moves the United States has submitted.

“For China, we need to have a firm, constructive, appropriate, but prudent, response,” said Wang Guangya, the country’s ambassador to the United Nations. “There have to be some punitive actions, but also I think these actions have to be appropriate.”

The United States wants agreement on sanctions this week. But even as the administration sought to push tough language into a Security Council resolution, the White House expressed doubts about the capacity of North Korea’s nuclear program, based on evidence that the reported test had a smaller yield than expected.

Sanctions sought by the United States include international inspections of all cargo moving in and out of North Korea to detect weapons-related material. But that might prove difficult for China and Russia to accept, in part because their coastlines and borders would be affected.

T

The United States has imposed economic curbs on North Korea since the opening of the Korean War in 1950, though President Clinton lifted a few of them toward the end of his time in office, when relations seemed to be thawing.

Now, in its bid to tighten sanctions, Bush administration officials say, the United States is pursuing a two-track approach: trying at the United Nations to persuade other countries to cut off economic ties with the North, and using American banking laws to punish banks overseas that deal with North Korean companies.

In the administration’s quest for tough sanctions, much of the effort is focused on China, Japan and especially South Korea, which supply most of North Korea’s imports and investments. Indeed, South Korea has invested heavily in the Kaesong Industrial Park, an economic enclave in the North that employs thousands in factories that produce shoes, cosmetics and other export goods.

The United States has tried, without much success, to get South Korea to limit its involvement in the enclave, arguing that North Korean financial institutions that are involved in it are also involved in illicit activities. In the wake of North Korea’s latest nuclear steps, persuading South Korea may be easier, American officials say.

The unilateral drive by the United States is likely to expand on existing efforts that American officials maintain have already had a damaging effect on North. Indeed, the sanctions may have propelled North Korea to walk away from negotiations on its nuclear program and test a weapon, some experts say.

Now, with the enactment of American laws and executive orders after Sept. 11, 2001, new tools have become available, and they are likely to be expanded in coming weeks.

Under the U.S.A. Patriot Act, signed into law shortly after the 2001 attacks, the United States labeled a bank in Macao, Banco Delta Asia, as a “primary money-laundering concern” and declared that any bank doing business on American soil — virtually every big bank in the world — could not do business with it.

Administration officials say the ban on Banco Delta Asia badly disrupted North Korean activities, effectively froze the personal accounts of North Korean leaders and sent a message throughout the international financial system that the United States was prepared to do more.

Backing up that threat, President Bush has accused several North Korean trading corporations of being involved in nuclear proliferation and missile activities, often in conjunction with Syria, Iran and Pakistan. American officials have also visited banks in Europe, Asia and the Middle East to tell them that dealings with those entities could jeopardize ties with American banks.

The aim, according to Stuart Levey, under secretary of the treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, is to put the international community “on notice about a particular threat” and get them to voluntarily end their dealings with North Korean entities.

John O’Neil reported from New York and Choe Sang-Hun reported from Seoul, South Korea. Thom Shanker, Steven R. Weisman, David E. Sanger and Sheryl Gay Stolberg contributed reporting from Washington, and Warren Hoge contributed reporting from the United Nations.

    Bush Says No Plans to Attack North Korea, NYT, 11.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/asia/12koreacnd.html?hp&ex=1160625600&en=ed3b8ae073434387&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Transcript

President Bush's News Conference

October 11, 2006
The New York Times

Following is the transcript of President George W. Bush's news conference from the White House, as provided by CQ Transcriptions, Inc.



BUSH: Before I take your questions, I'd like to discuss a couple subjects.



First, I want to briefly mention that today we've released the actual budget numbers for the fiscal year that ended on September the 30th. These numbers show that we have now achieved our goal of cutting the federal budget deficit in half, and we've done it three years ahead of schedule.



The budget numbers are proof that pro-growth economic policies work. By restraining spending in Washington and allowing Americans to keep more of what they earn, economy's creating jobs and reducing the deficit and making our nation a more prosperous nation for all our citizens.



I'm going to talk about the pro-growth economic policies that helped bring about the dramatic reduction in the deficit this afternoon. And I'm going to remind our fellow citizens that good tax policy has a lot to do with keeping the economy strong, and therefore we'll continue to urge the Congress to make the tax cuts permanent.



I also want to talk about the unfolding situation in North Korea.



Earlier this week, the government of North Korea proclaimed to the world that it had conducted a successful nuclear test. The United States is working to confirm North Korea's claim, but this claim itself constitutes a threat to international peace and stability.



In response to North Korea's actions, we're working with our partners in the region and the United Nations Security Council to ensure there are serious repercussions for the regime in Pyongyang.



I've spoken with other world leaders, including Japan, China, South Korea and Russia. We all agree that there must be a strong Security Council resolution that will require North Korea to abide by its international commitments to dismantle its nuclear programs.



This resolution should also specify a series of measures to prevent North Korea from exporting nuclear or missile technologies and prevent financial transactions or asset transfers that would help North Korea develop its nuclear missile capabilities.



Last year, North Korea agreed to a path to a better future for its people in the six-party talks. September of last year, we had an agreement with North Korea.



It came about in the form of what we call the six-party joint statement. It offered the prospect for normalized relations with both Japan and the United States. It talked about economic cooperation and energy trade and investment.



In that joint statement, North Korea committed to abandoning all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs and to adhering to the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and to IAEA safeguards.



They agreed.



The United States affirmed that we have no nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula. We affirmed that we have no intention of attacking North Korea.



With its actions this week, North Korea has once again chosen to reject the prospect for a better future offered by the six-party joint statement. Instead, it has opted to raise tensions in the region.



I'm pleased that the nations in the region are making clear to North Korea what is at stake.



I thank China, South Korea, Japan and Russia for their strong statements of condemnation of North Korea's actions.



Peace on the Korean Peninsula requires that these nations send a clear message to Pyongyang that its actions will not be tolerated. And I appreciate their leadership.



The United States remains committed to diplomacy. The United States also reserves all options to defend our friends and our interests in the region against the threats from North Korea.



So in response to North Korea's provocation, we will increase defense cooperation with our allies, including cooperation on ballistic missile defense to protect against North Korean aggression, and cooperation to prevent North Korea from exporting nuclear and missile technologies.



Our goals remain clear: peace and security in Northeast Asia and a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.



We will take the necessary actions to achieve these goals. We will work with the United Nations. We'll support our allies in the region. And together we will ensure that North Korea understands the consequences if it continues down its current path.



I'd like to discus the latest developments in Iraq.



This morning I just had a meeting with Secretary Rumsfeld and General George Casey, who's in town today. General Casey, as you know, is the top commander on the ground in Iraq.



The brutality of Iraq's enemies has been on full display in recent days. Earlier this week, Deputy President Tariq al-Hashimi lost his brother, Major General Hashimi, when gunmen dressed in police uniforms broke into his house and shot him in the head. Only a few months ago, his sister and another brother were assassinated.



On behalf of the United States, I express my heartfelt condolences to the al-Hashimi family. And we express our condolences to all those who have suffered at the hands of these brutal killers.



The situation is difficult in Iraq, no question about it.



The violence is being caused by a combination of terrorists, elements of former regime criminals and sectarian militias. Attacks and casualties has risen during the Ramadan period. A rise in violence has occurred every Ramadan period in the last three years.



Attacks and casualties have also increased recently because our forces are confronting the enemy in Baghdad and in other parts of Iraq. The past weekend, U.S. and Iraqi forces engaged militias, or members of an illegal militia, during a mission to capture a high- value target.



The reason I bring this up is that we're on the move; we're taking action; we're helping this young democracy succeed.



The reasons we went after the illegal militia was to capture a man responsible for killing many innocent Iraqis, and we accomplished that mission.



Our troops have increased their presence on the streets of Baghdad.



Together with Iraqi forces, they're working to ensure that terrorists and death squads cannot intimidate the local population and operate murder rings.



Amid the violence, important political developments are also taking place.



The Iraqi legislature reached a compromise and set up a process for addressing the difficult issues of federalism and constitutional reform.



In addition, the government of Prime Minister Maliki has taken three important steps to build confidence in his government and in the Iraqi security forces.



First, Prime Minister Maliki announced a plan to bring together Sunni and Shia parties and stop sectarian violence.



The prime minister's plan has received support from every major political group in Iraq, including some hard-line Sunni elements that chose not to join the unity government.



Among the steps the prime minister announced is a new system of local and neighborhood committees, made up of both Sunni and Shia members, that will work directly with Iraqi security forces to resolve tensions and stop sectarian strife.



Second, this past weekend Prime Minister Maliki met with tribal leaders from the Anbar Province. These tribal leaders told him they've had enough of the terrorists seeking to control the Sunni heartland, and they're ready to stand up and fight Al Qaida.



The prime minister told them that he welcomed their support and would help them.



Third, Prime Minister Maliki's government suspended the 8th Brigade, 2nd Division of the National Police after learning that this unit was not intervening to stop sectarian violence in and around Baghdad.



This police brigade has been de-certified by the Iraqi Ministry of Interior. It's been removed from service. It's now being reviewed and re-trained.



With this action, the Iraqi government's made clear it's not going to tolerate the infiltration of the Iraqi security forces by militias and sectarians interests.



The reason I bring this up -- these examples up is that there's a political process that's going forward. And it's the combination of security and a political process that will enable the United States to achieve our objective, which is an Iraq that can govern itself, sustain itself, defend itself and be an ally in this war on terror.



Iraq's government -- Iraq's democratic government is just four months old. Yet in the face of terrorist threats and sectarian violence, Iraq's new leaders are beginning to make tough choices.



And as they make these tough decisions, we'll stand with them. We'll help them. It's in our interests that Iraq succeed.



Look, I fully understand the American people are seeing unspeakable violence on their TV screens. These are tough times in Iraq.



The enemy's doing everything within its power to destroy the government and to drive us out of the Middle East, starting with driving us out of Iraq before the mission is done.



The stakes are high. As a matter of fact, they couldn't be higher.



If we were to abandon that country before the Iraqis can defend their young democracy, the terrorists would take control of Iraq and establish a new safe haven from which to launch new attacks on America.



How do I know that would happen? Because that's what the enemy has told us would happen. That's what they have said.



And as commander in chief of the United States military, and as a person working to secure this country, I take the words of the enemy very seriously, and so should the American people.



We can't tolerate a new terrorist state in the heart of the Middle East with large oil reserves that could be used to fund its radical ambitions or used to inflict economic damage on the West.



By helping the Iraqis build a democracy -- an Iraqi-style democracy -- we will deal a major blow to terrorist and extremists, we'll bring hope to a troubled region, and we'll make this country more secure.



With that, I'll take some questions, starting with Terry Hunt.



QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.



Democrats say that North Korea's reported test shows that your policy has been a failure; that you got bogged down in Iraq where there were no weapons of mass destruction while North Korea was moving ahead with the bomb.



Is your administration to blame for letting North Korea get this far?



BUSH: North Korea has been trying to acquire bombs and weapons for a long period of time -- long before I came into office.



And it's a threat that we've got to take seriously. And we do, of course.



In 1994, the government -- our government entered into a bilateral arrangement with the North Koreans that worked to make sure that they don't have the capacity to develop a bomb. And North Korea agreed that there would be no program whatsoever toward the development of a weapon.



And yet we came into office and discovered that they were developing a program, unbeknownst to the folks with whom they signed the agreement, the United States government. And we confronted them with that evidence, and they admitted it was true, and then left the agreement that they had signed with the U.S. government.



And my point -- and then, as I mentioned in my opening statement, we once again had North Korea at the table, this time with other parties at the table. And they agreed once again through this statement, as a result of the six-party talks, to verifiably show that they weren't advancing a nuclear weapons program.



And they chose again to leave.



And my point to you is that it's the intransigence of the North Korean leader that speaks volumes about the process. It is his unwillingness to choose a way forward for this country -- a better way forward for his country. It is his decisions.



And what's changed since then is that we now have other parties at the table who have made it clear to North Korea that they share the same goals of the United States, which is a nuclear-weapons-free peninsula.



The -- you know, I -- obviously I'm listening very carefully to this debate.



I can remember the time when it was said that, The Bush administration goes it alone too often in the world, which I always thought was a bogus claim to begin with. And now all of a sudden, people are saying, you know, The Bush administration ought to be going it alone with North Korea.



But it didn't work in the past, is my point. The strategy did not work.



I learned a lesson from that and decided that the best way to convince Kim Jong Il to change his mind on a nuclear weapons program is to have others send the same message.



And so in my phone calls that I recently made right after the test I lamented the fact that he had tested to Hu Jintao and also lamented the fact that Hu Jintao had publicly asked him not to test.



I talked to the South Korean president, and I said, It ought to be clear to us now that we must continue to work together to make it abundantly clear to the leader in North Korea that there's a better way forward; when he walks away from agreement he's not just walking away from the table with the United States as the only participant. He's walking away from a table that others are sitting at.



And my point to you is: In order to solve this diplomatically, the United States and our partners must have a strong diplomatic hand. And you have a better diplomatic hand with others, sending the message, than you do when you're alone.



And so, obviously, I made the decision that the bilateral negotiations wouldn't work. And the reason I made that decision is because they didn't.



And we'll continue to work to come up with a diplomatic solution to North Korea. This is a serious issue.



But I want to remind our fellow citizens that the North Korea issue was serious for years. And I'll also remind our citizens that we want to make sure that we solve this problem diplomatically. We've got to give every effort to do so.



But in my discussions with our partners, I reassured them that the security agreements we have with them will be enforced, if need be. And that's in particular to South Korea and Japan.



Senator Warner says Iraq appears to be drifting sideways. And James Baker says a change in strategy may be needed.



QUESTION: Are you willing to acknowledge that a change may be needed?



BUSH: We're constantly changing tactics to achieve a strategic goal. Our strategic goal is a country which can defend itself, sustain itself and govern itself.



The strategic goal is to help this young democracy succeed in a world in which extremists are trying to intimidate rational people in order to topple moderate governments and to extend the caliphate.



The stakes couldn't be any higher, as I said earlier, in the world in which we live. There are extreme elements that use religion to achieve objectives. And they want us to leave. And they want to topple government. They want to extend an ideological caliphate that has no concept of liberty inherent in their beliefs.



They want to control oil resources and they want to plot and plan and attack us again. That's their objectives.



And so -- and our strategic objective is to prevent them from doing that. And we're constantly changing tactics to achieve that objective. And I appreciate Senator Warner going over there and taking a look.



I want you to notice what he did say is: If the plan is now not working, the plan that's in place isn't working, America needs to adjust. I completely agree. That's what I talked to General Casey about.



I said: General, the Baghdad security plan is in its early implementation. I support you strongly but, if you come into this office and say we need to do something differently, I support you. If you need more troops, I support you. If you're going to devise a new strategy, we're with you. Because I trust General Casey to make the judgments necessary to put the tactics in place to help us achieve an objective.



And I appreciate Jimmy Baker's willingness to -- he and Lee Hamilton are putting this -- they got a group they put together that -- I think it was Congressman Wolf's suggestion -- or passed into law.



We supported the idea. I think it's good to have some of our elder statesmen -- I hate to call Baker an elder statesman -- but to go over there and take a look and to come back and make recommendations.



Somebody said he said, Well, you know, cut-and-run isn't working. That's not our policy.



Our policy is to help this country succeed, because I understand the stakes. And I'm going to repeat them one more time. As a matter of fact, I'm going to spend a lot of time repeating the stakes about what life is like in the Middle East.



It is conceivable that there will be a world in which radical forms -- extreme forms of religion fight each other for influence in the Middle East; in which they've got the capacity to use oil as an economic weapon.



And when you throw into that mix a nuclear weapon in the hands of a sworn enemy of the United States, you begin to see an environment that would cause some later on in history to look back and say, How come they couldn't see the problem? What happened to them in the year 2006? Why weren't they able to see the problems now and deal with them before it came too late?



And so Iraq is an important part of dealing with this problem. And my vow to the American people is I understand the stakes, and I understand what it would mean for us to leave before the job is done.



And I look forward to listening to how -- what Jimmy Baker and Lee Hamilton say about how to get the job done.



I appreciate them working on this issue, because I think they understand what I know: The stakes are high.



And the stakes are high when it comes to developing a Palestinian state so that Israel can live at peace.



And the stakes are high when it comes to making sure the young democracy of Lebanon is able to fend off the extremists and radicals that want to crater that democracy.



This is a real challenge of the 21st century. I like to tell people we're in an ideological struggle. And it's a struggle between extremists and radicals and people of moderation who want to simply live a peaceful life.



And the calling of this country and in this century is whether or not we will help the forces of moderation prevail. That's the fundamental question facing the United States of America beyond my presidency.



And you can tell I've made my choice. And I made my choice because the most solemn duty of the American president, in government, is to protect this country from harm.



Martha -- I'm sure with a profound follow-up.



QUESTION: Can we go back to North Korea, Mr. President?



BUSH: Please.



QUESTION: You talk about failures of the past administration with the policy toward North Korea.



Again, how can you say your policy is more successful, given that North Korea has apparently tested a nuclear weapon?



And also, if you wouldn't mind, what is the red line for North Korea, given what has happened over the past few months?



BUSH: My point was: Bilateral negotiations didn't work. You know, I appreciate the efforts of previous administrations. It just didn't work.



And, therefore, I thought it was important to change how we approached the problem so that we could solve it diplomatically.



And I firmly believe that with North Korea -- and with Iran -- that it is best to deal with these regimes with more than one voice.



Because I understand how it works. What ends up happening is that, you know, we say to a country such as North Korea, Here's a reasonable way forward. They try to extract more at the negotiating table or they've got a different objective.



And then they go and say, Wait a minute; the United States is being unreasonable.



They make a threat. They could -- you know, they say the world is about to fall apart because of the United States's problem. And, all of a sudden, we become the issue.



But the United States' message to North Korea and Iran and the people in both countries is that we have -- we want to solve the issues peacefully.



We said: There's a better way forward for you. Here's a chance, for example, to help your country economically. And all you got to do is verifiably show that you're -- in Iran's cases, that you've suspended your weapons program; in North Korea's case, that you've got international safeguards on your program. Which they agreed to, by the way.



And so my point is that, to the American people, I say: Look, we want to solve this diplomatically. It's important for the president to say to the American people: Diplomacy was what is our first choice. And I've now outlined a strategy.



And I think it is a hopeful sign that China is now an integral partner in helping North Korea understand that it's just not the United States speaking to them.



And it's an important sign to North Korea that South Korea -- a country which obviously is deeply concerned about North Korean activities -- South Korea is a partner.



If North Korea decides that, you know, they don't like what's being said, they're not just stiffing the United States -- I don't know if that's a diplomatic word or not -- but they're sending a message to countries in the neighborhood that they really don't care what other countries think, which leads to further isolation.



And when we get a U.N. Security Council resolution, it will help us deal with issues like proliferation and his ability -- he, being Kim Jong Il's ability to attract money to continue to develop his program.



QUESTION: What about the red line, sir?



BUSH: Well, the world has made it clear that these tests caused us to come together and work in the United Nations to send a clear message to the North Korean regime. We're bound up together with a common strategy to solve this issue peacefully, through diplomatic means.



QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.



BUSH: If I might say, that is a beautiful suit.



QUESTION: Thank you, sir. My tailor appreciates that.



BUSH: And I can't see anybody else who even comes close.



(LAUGHTER)



QUESTION: Thank you very much. I'll be happy to pass along my tailor's number...



(CROSSTALK)



QUESTION: ... if you'd like that, sir.



BUSH: I'll take that back. I will recognize that -- please?



QUESTION: On May 23rd, 2003, sir, you said -- you effectively drew a line in the sand. You said, We will not tolerate a nuclear North Korea. And, yet, now it appears that they have crossed that line. And I'm wondering what now, sir, do you say to both the American people and the international community vis-a-vis what has happened over the last 48 hours?



BUSH: No, I appreciate that. And I think it's very important for the American people and North Korea to understand that that statement still stands. And one way to make sure that we're able to achieve our objective is to have other people join us in making it clear to North Korea that they share that objective.



And that's what's changed. That's what changed over a relatively quick period of time.



It used to be that the United States would say that, and that would be kind of a stand-alone statement. Now, when that statement is said, there are other nations in the neighborhood saying it.



And so we'll give diplomacy a chance to work. It is very important for us to solve these problems diplomatically. And I thank the leaders of -- listen, when I call them on the phone, we're strategizing.



This isn't, you know: Oh, please stand up and say something. This is: How can we continue to work together to solve this problem? And that is a substantial change from the previous times.



Suzanne, the second -- the first best-dressed person here. Sorry.



QUESTION: Kevin and I coordinated.



BUSH: Yes. No, actually it looks -- yeah.



QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.



QUESTION: Back on Iraq, a group of American and Iraqi health officials today released a report saying that 655,000 Iraqis have died since the Iraq war.



That figure is 20 times the figure that you cited in December at 30,000. Do you care to amend or update your figure? And do you consider this a credible report?



BUSH: No, I don't consider it a credible report. Neither does General Casey and neither do Iraqi officials.



I do -- I do know that a lot of innocent people have died, and that troubles me. And it grieves me. And I applaud the Iraqis for their courage in the face of violence.



I am, you know, amazed that this is a society which so wants to be free that they're willing to -- you know, that there's a level of violence that they tolerate.



And it's now time for the Iraqi government to work hard to bring security in neighborhoods so people can feel -- can feel, you know, at peace.



No question it's violent. But this report is one -- they put it out before. It was pretty well -- the methodology is pretty well discredited.



But I, you know, talk to people like General Casey. And, of course, the Iraqi government put out a statement talking about the report.



QUESTION: So the figure's 30,000, Mr. President? Do you stand by your figure, 30,000?



BUSH: I, you know, I stand by the figure a lot of innocent people have lost their life. 600,000 or whatever they guessed at is just, it's not credible. Thank you.



QUESTION: Since you last held a news conference here in the Rose Garden about a month ago, Republicans across the country have seen races that were once safe tighten, with the tide turning, according to several polls, toward the Democrats.



Understanding that you don't lead by looking at polls...



BUSH: Thank you, sir. Thank you kindly.



QUESTION: ... as you've said many times, are you still confident Republicans will hold the House and Senate?



BUSH: Yes. I am.



QUESTION: If so, why? And do you believe that the biggest drag on the Republican Party is the situation in Iraq?



BUSH: I believe that the situation in Iraq is, no question, tough on the American psych -- like I said, I think, at this very spot, last time I faced the press corps.



And it's serious business. Look, the American people want to know: Can we win? That's what they want to know. And we do we have a plan to win?



There are some who say: Get out; it's not worth it. And those are some of the voices, by the way, in the Democrat Party. Certainly not all Democrats, but some of the loud voices in the party say: Get out.



And so, no question, this is an issue. But so is the economy. And I believe there will be -- I still stand by my prediction we'll have a Republican speaker and Republican leader of the Senate.



And the reason I say that is because I believe the two biggest issues in this campaign are, one, the economy -- and the economy is growing. The national unemployment rate is 4.6 percent.'



We've just discovered, as the result of analyzing new data, that we added 6.6 million new jobs since August of 2003.



Gas prices are down. Tax cuts are working. And there's a difference of opinion in the campaign about taxes.



And we will keep them low. As a matter of fact, I would like to keep -- make the tax cuts we passed permanent. And the Democrats will raise taxes.



Now, I know they say, Only on rich people, but that's, in my judgment, having been around here long enough to know, it's just codeword. They're going to raise them on whoever they can raise them on.



And then, on security: The American people know that our biggest job is to protect this country from further attack. And -- because they know there's an enemy that still plots and plans, and there is.



There is.



Recently we learned that when British intelligence and U.S. intelligence, with our help, broke up a plot to get on airplanes and blow them up; the planes that were going to fly from Great Britain to here.



And they want to know -- they, the people, want to know: What are we doing to protect them?



There had been some votes on the floor of the Senate and the House that make it abundantly clear we just have a different view of the world.



The vast majority of Democrats voted against a program that will enable us to interrogate high-valued detainees. That was the vote. It was wide open for everybody to see: Should a CIA program go forward or not go forward?



A vast majority of Democrats in the House voted against a program that would have institutionalized the capacity for this government to listen to Al Qaida phone calls or Al Qaida affiliate phone calls coming from outside the country to inside the country.



It's very important for our fellow citizens to recognize that I don't question anybody's patriotism. But I do question a strategy that says we can't give those on the front line of fighting terror the tools necessary to fight terror.



I believe that in order to defend America we must take a threat seriously and defeat an enemy overseas so we don't have to face them here. I don't believe we can wait to respond after attack has occurred.



And so I think these are the two biggest issues. And Iraq is a part of the war on terror.



Now, I recognize Democrats say that's not the case. And what I say to the American people when I'm out there is all you got to do is listen to what Osama bin Laden says. Don't believe me that it's a part of the war on terror. Listen to the enemy, or listen to Mr. Zawahiri, the number two of Al Qaida; both of whom made it clear that Iraq is central in their plans.



And I firmly believe that the American people understand that this is different from other war because in this war if we were to leave early, before the job is done, then the enemy will follow us here.



And so I believe that we'll maintain control because we're on the right side of the economic issue and the security issue.



Let's see. Yes, sir (inaudible). Welcome to the front row.



QUESTION: Thank you. It's good to be here. Appreciate it.



Following up on that answer, one of the things Democrats complain about is the way you portray their position...



BUSH: Oh, really?



QUESTION: ... in wanting to fight the war on terror. They would say you portray is as either they support exactly what you want to do or they want to do nothing. We hear it in some of your speeches.



Is it fair to portray it to the American people that way?



Well, I think it's fair to use the words of people in Congress or their votes. The vote was, on the Hamdan legislation: Do you want to continue a program that enabled us to interrogate folks or not?



And all I was doing was reciting the votes.



I would cite my opponent in the 2004 campaign, when he said there needs to be a date certain from which to withdraw from Iraq. I characterize that as cut and run, because I believe it is cut and run. In other words, I've been using either their votes or their words to characterize their positions.



QUESTION: But they don't say, Cut and run.



BUSH: Well, they may not use, Cut and run, but they say, Date certain, as to when to get out before the job is done; that is cut and run. You know, nobody's accused me of having a real sophisticated vocabulary; I understand that.



And maybe their words are more sophisticated than mine. But when you pull out before the job is done, that's cut and run, as far as I'm concerned. And that's cut and run as far as most Americans are concerned.



And so, yes, I'm going to continue reminding them of their words and their votes.



QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.



My best suit's in the cleaners.



BUSH: That's not even a suit.



QUESTION: I know.



(LAUGHTER)



You got to give me more time in the morning with the news conference.



BUSH: Yes, I know. You like to wake up about 8:30...



(LAUGHTER)



QUESTION: I want to ask you...



BUSH: High-price news guys...



QUESTION: Yes...



(LAUGHTER)



QUESTION: I want to ask you a little bit about -- I want to follow on the criticism that you have received, or the suggestions from Senator Warner and from James Baker...



BUSH: Yes.



QUESTION: ... and now Olympia Snowe. This is not exactly the board of directors for moveon.org.



BUSH: That's true.



QUESTION: Do you feel in some way that there is some shift going on in terms of the general support for the war in Iraq and your strategy, specifically?



QUESTION: And do you ever feel like the walls are closing in on you, in terms of support for this?



BUSH: I understand how hard it is. And I also understand the stakes. And let me go back to Senator Warner. Senator Warner said: If the plan isn't working, adjust. I agree completely.



You know, I haven't seen Baker's report yet. But one of the things I'd remind you of is that I don't hear those people saying: Get out before the job is done.



They're saying: Be flexible. And we are.



I believe that, you know, you empower your generals to make the decisions -- the recommendations on what we do to win.



You can't fight a war from Washington. In other words, you can't make the tactical decisions necessary to win. It just won't work.



And I trust General Casey. I find him to be one of the really competent, decent guys.



Let me finish, please, for a second. Plus, I couldn't hear you, but I saw you talking, anyway.



I value his judgment. I value his -- I know he wants to succeed. And I value his objectivity. And he -- what's important for the president is when I open up that door in there and General Casey walks in, he feels confident to tell me what's on his mind. Here's what's going right and here's what's going wrong and here's what we're doing about it.



And so for those folks saying make sure there's flexibility, I couldn't agree more with you. And I think the characterization of, you know, Stay the course, is about a quarter right.



Stay the course means keep doing what you're doing. My attitude is, don't do what you're doing if it's not working; change.



Stay the course also means don't leave before the job is done. We're going to get the job done in Iraq. And it's important that we do get the job done in Iraq.



Defeat in Iraq will embolden an enemy. And I want to repeat to you the reality of the world in which we live. If we were to leave before the job is done, the enemy's coming after us. And most Americans -- back to your question -- understand we've got to defeat them there so we don't face them here. It's a different kind of war but, nevertheless, it is a war. And -- go ahead.



QUESTION: I'm just wondering: Two months ago, Prime Minister Maliki was here and you talked about how we had to be nimble and facile in our approach. And my question is...



BUSH: Yes.



QUESTION: ... are we being nimble and facile in the right way? Is what General Casey telling you the most effective advice? Because it would seem that, in the two months since Prime Minister Maliki was here, things have only gotten more bloody in Iraq?



BUSH: No question, Ramadan's here. No question, we're engaging the enemy more than we were before. And by the way, when you engage the enemy, it causes there to be more action and more kinetic action.



And the fundamental question is: Do I get good advice from Casey? And the answer is: I believe I do. I believe I do.



Yes?



QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) Ramadan, sir?



BUSH: Please.



QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President. You spoke very passionately before about acting before it was too late on major issues. You faced one of those moments in early 2003. This was when the North Koreans had thrown out the international inspectors, said they were going to go ahead and turn their fuel into weapons.



QUESTION: And you had a moment to tell them that they would face serious consequences if they were going to do that. You also had what may have been the last moment for any American president to destroy their fuel supplies while they were all in one place.



BUSH: You mean bombing them?



QUESTION: Whatever action you might have needed to take, including military action against the site, the one site at the time, where they were getting ready...



BUSH: I just wanted to clarify. I'm sorry to interrupt you.



QUESTION: Yes.



And you chose not to. And I was wondering whether in retrospect you regret that decision at all, whether or not you think that because of the long history of deception that you pointed out before you should have acted differently.



BUSH: I used the moment to continue my desire to convince others to become equity partners in the Korean issue -- North Korean issue -- because I obviously look at all options, all the time. And I felt like the best way to solve this problem would be through a diplomacy effort that was renewed and reinvigorated by having China and South Korea and Japan and Russia joining us in convincing Kim Jong Il there's a better way forward.



And frankly, I was quite optimistic that we had succeeded last September when we had this joint statement, which you adequately covered. And -- and yet he walked away from it. He decided, well, maybe his word doesn't mean anything.



And so we will continue to work diplomatically to solve the problem. That's what I owe the American people, to come up with a diplomatic solution.



I also made it clear, and I will repeat, that we have security obligations in the region that I reconfirmed to our partners.



Sir? Washington Post man.



QUESTION: Good morning, Mr. President.



BUSH: That would be Mike.



QUESTION: Right. I'd like to follow up on a(n) earlier question about your rhetoric on Iran and North Korea.



BUSH: OK.



QUESTION: You said yesterday, in your statement, that the North Korean nuclear test was unacceptable.



Your chief negotiator for the six-party talks said last week that North Korea has a choice, of either having weapons or having a future.



When you spoke, a month or so ago, to the American Legion, you talked about Iran and said: There must be consequences for Iran's defiance and we must not allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.



I'm wondering, sir -- your administration has issued these kinds of warning pretty regularly over the last five years. And yet these countries have pursued their nuclear programs.



I'm wondering: What is different about the current set of warnings? And do you think the administration -- our government runs the risk of looking feckless to world by issuing these kinds of warnings regularly without response from the countries?



BUSH: That's a fair question. First of all, I am making it clear our policy hadn't changed.



It's important for the folks to understand that we don't continually shift our goals based upon, you know, polls or whatever.



See, I think clarity of purpose is very important to rally a diplomatic effort to solve the problem. And so I try to speak as clearly as I can and make sure there's no ambiguity in our position.



I also found that's a pretty good way to help rally a diplomatic effort that I believe will more likely work.



I know this sounds just saying it over and over again, but it's -- rhetoric and actions are all aimed at convincing others that they have an equal stake in whether or not these nations have a nuclear weapon, because I firmly believe that that is the best strategy to solve the problem.



I mean, one has a stronger hand when there's more people playing your same cards. It is much easier for a nation to hear what I believe are legitimate demands if there's more than one voice speaking. And that's why we're doing what we're doing.



And to answer your question as to whether or not the words will be empty, I would suggest that, quite the contrary, that we not only have spoken about the goals, but as a result of working together, our friends, Iran and North Korea are looking at a different diplomatic scenario.



I thought you were going to ask the question, following up on Sanger: How come you don't use military action now?



You kind of hinted it. You didn't say it.



Now, and some wonder that. As a matter of fact, I'm asked questions around the country: Just go ahead and use the military. And my answer is is that I believe the commander in chief must try all diplomatic measures before we commit our military. And I believe the diplomacy is, you know, we're making progress when we've got others at the table, you know?



I will ask myself a follow-up: If that's the case, why did you use military action in Iraq?



(LAUGHTER)



And the reason why is because we tried the diplomacy. Remember it? We tried resolution after resolution after resolution. All these, these -- these situations are, each of them, different and require a different response, a different effort to try to resolve this peacefully.



And we'll continue to do so.



The inability to convince people to move forward speaks volumes about them. It ought to say to all the world that we're dealing with people that maybe don't want peace -- which, in my judgment, in order for there to be peace requires an international response.



It says volumes about a person who signs an agreement with one administration and signs an agreement or speaks about an agreement with another administration and it doesn't honor the agreement.



It points up the fact that these are dangerous regimes and requires an international effort to work in concert.



QUESTION: Thank you.



I'd like to turn back to North Korea for a bit. You've said that bilateral talks didn't work. Secretary Baker has said that maybe they should be considered maybe at some point and under certain conditions.



Are you prepared now to just take the possibility of one-on-one talks with North Korea off the table?



BUSH: I'm saying as loud as I can and as clear as I can that there is a better way forward for North Korea and that we will work within the context of the six-party talks.



People say: You don't talk to North Korea. Look, we had a representative -- a United States representative -- at the table in the six-party talks.



The North Korean leader knows our position. It's easy to understand our position. There is a better way forward for his government.



And people need to review the September '05 document. It's a joint statement that talked about economics and that, you know, we won't attack North Korea. We agreed that we shouldn't have nuclear weapons on the peninsula.



I mean, there is a way forward for the leader of North Korea to choose.



We've made our choice.



And so has China, South Korea, Japan and Russia. And that's what's changed.



I also am deeply concerned about the lives of the citizens in that country. I mean, there's -- and that's why I named an envoy, Jay Lefkowitz, to talk about the human condition inside of North Korea. And the reason we do that is we care about how people live, we care about people starving, we care about the fact that there are large concentration camps.



You know, one of the most meaningful moments of my presidency came when a Japanese mother came to the Oval Office to talk about what it was like to have her daughter kidnapped by North Korea.



You can imagine what that was like. It broke my heart. And it should break everybody's heart. But it speaks to the nature of the regime.



And therefore we -- I am convinced that, to solve this diplomatically requires more than just America's voice.



QUESTION: Mr. President, with growing numbers of House members and staffers saying that they knew of and told others about a problem with Mark Foley some years ago, has House Speaker Hastert lost touch within his own ranks? And has the scandal damaged Hastert's credibility and effectiveness in maintaining party control in the midterm elections?



BUSH: No, I think the speaker's strong statements have made it clear to not only the party members, but to the country, that he wants to find out the facts.



All of us want to find out the facts. I mean, this is disgusting behavior when a member of Congress betrays the trust of the Congress and a family that sent a young page up to serve in the Congress.



I appreciated Speaker Hastert's strong declaration of his desire to get to the bottom of it. You know, we want to make sure what we understand what Republicans knew and what Democrats knew in order to find the facts. And I hope that happens sooner rather than later.



QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)



BUSH: Oh, Denny's very credible as far as I'm concerned. And he's done a fine job as speaker, when he stands up and says: I want to know the truth. And I believe yesterday he said that if somebody on his staff, you know, didn't tell him the truth, they're gone. I respect that and appreciate that and believe him.



I think the elections will be decided by security and the economy. I really do. I know this is -- this Foley issue bothers a lot of people, including me.



But I think when they get in that booth, they're going to be thinking about, you know, how best to secure the country from attack, and, you know, how best to keep the economy growing. I think the last time I was out here with you I reminded you that I understand that the economy is always a salient issue in campaigns. We've had some experience with that in my family I think I said. I still believe the economy's an important issue, and I believe on this issue there is a huge difference of opinion.



The other day, by the way, Don, I did bring up the words of the leader of the House when she said, "I love tax cuts," and then, I reminded everybody that if she loved them so much, how come she voted against a lot of tax cuts. In other words -- again, back to your question about whether it's fair to use people's words -- I think to say, "I love tax cuts," and then vote against tax cuts it's just -- it's worthy. It's worthy of people's consideration in the political process.



I believe taxes are a big issue in the campaign. And I know how -- I know that how best to protect the country is a big issue, a really big issue. And, you know, there's just a kind of law enforcement mentality that says: Well, we'll respond after attack.



It's not going to work. It's just not going to work. We've got to deal with these problems before they come to -- before they come to our territory.



I understand that some are saying, Well, he's just trying to scare us.



My job is to look at the intelligence and to -- and I'm going to tell you that there's an enemy out there that would like to do harm again to the United States, because we're in a war. And they have objectives. They want to -- they want to drive us out of parts of the world to establish a caliphate. It's what they have told us.




And it's essential that we listen to the words of the enemy if we want to protect the American people.



And in this debate about which party can handle it better, I will -- I think it's very important that no one question the patriotism or, you know, the loyalty to the country. There is a different mindset, however, that is worth discussing in the course of a campaign, and I'm going to continue to do it. And I believe those two issues will be the issue that drive the election.



QUESTION: Thank you, sir.



Mr. President, some in the national security community are wondering if, indeed, you are ready to live with a nuclear North Korea.



BUSH: No.



QUESTION: Well, they're saying that that is a possibility.



BUSH: Well, they're wrong.



QUESTION: Well, can I give you...



BUSH: Well, it's a short question -- a short answer. I mean...



QUESTION: One, China is not ready to put teeth behind sanctions, enough teeth to really threaten the regime, and also, economic sanctions have limited effect on North Korea.



BUSH: Hmm. Yeah. We got to try it diplomatically first, April. And, you know, this is -- this is back to old Michael's question about am I serious about saying what I mean? And it's -- well, I say what I say because some people are beginning to wonder whether or not it's the goal. The goal is no nuclear weapon. And again, I think I've shared with you my views of diplomacy.



Diplomacy is -- it's a -- it's a difficult process because everybody's interests aren't exactly the same. We share the same goal, but sometimes the internal issues, you know, are different from ours, and therefore it takes a while to get people on the same page, and it takes a while for people to get used to consequences. And so I wouldn't necessarily characterize these countries' positions as, you know, locked-in positions.



We're constantly dialoguing with them to make sure that there is a common effort to send a clear message.



And the other part of your question was?



QUESTION: And the follow-up, yes. Military options -- there are a menu of options. The White House is saying once diplomacy has run its course and you've run through your timetable, what about military options against North Korea?



BUSH: Well, diplomacy hasn't run its course, that's what I'm trying to explain to you -- a la the Sanger question. And we'll continue working to make sure we give diplomacy a full opportunity to succeed.



QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.



You spoke of the troubles in Iraq. And as you know, we have Woodward and we have a shelf full of books about Iraq, and many of them claim that administration policies contributed to the difficulties there.



So I'm wondering: Is there anything you wish you would have done different with regard to Iraq?



BUSH: You know, speaking about books, somebody ought to add up the number of pages that have been written about my administration.



There's a lot of books out there -- a lot.



I don't know if I set the record or not, but I guess it means that I made some hard decisions and will continue to make hard decisions.



And this is the -- this is about the fifth time I've been asked this type of question and, as you know, there are some things that I wish had happened differently.



Abu Ghraib: I believe that really hurt us. It hurt us internationally. It kind of eased us off the moral high ground; we weren't a country that was capable of, one the one hand, promoting democracy and then treating people decently. Now the world is seeing that we've held those to account who did this.



It's just a lot of look-backs. Presidents don't get to look back but, I will tell you, the decision to remove Saddam was the right decision. And I would look forward to the debate where people debate whether or not Saddam should still be in power.



As you know, the leader in the Senate Intel Committee on -- I think it was CBS News, Axelrod; I'm not sure; you follow your news closely; you can verify this -- said that the world would be better if Saddam were in power. I strongly disagree. When it comes to that decision, which is the decision that caused a lot of people to write books, it's the right decision.



And now the fundamental question is: Will this country help this young democracy succeed? And the answer is: We will. We'll change tactics when we need to change tactics to help this young democracy succeed.



But the stakes are high if we were to leave. It means that we would hand over a part of the region to extremists and radicals who would glorify a victory over the United States and use it to become -- use it to recruit. It would give these people a chance to plot and plan and attack. It would give them resources from which to continue their efforts to spread their caliphate.



The stakes are really high.



QUESTION: On a different topic, you have said you will sign the border fence bill to build 700 miles of fence along the U.S. border, but DHS has said it prefers a virtual fence of sensors and cameras, rather than an actual wall.



Will you -- are you committed to building the 700 miles of fence -- actual fencing?



BUSH: Yeah, we're going to do both. We're just going to make sure that we build it in a spot where it works.



I don't -- I don't -- DHS said they want a virtual wall. I don't believe that's the only thing they said. I think you might have truncated their statement, because we're actually building fence, and we're building double fence in particular areas where there is a high vulnerability for people being able to sneak in.



You can't fence the entire border, but what you can do is you can use a combination of fencing and technology to make it easier for the Border Patrol to enforce our border.



I happen to believe, however, that in order to make sure the border is fully secure, we need a guest worker program so people aren't sneaking in in the first place.



And so I look forward to not only implementing that which Congress has funded in a way that says to folks, to the American people: We'll enforce our border.



But I'm going to continue to campaign and work for a comprehensive bill so that whatever we do in terms of equipment and manpower works better.



If somebody's not trying to sneak in to work -- in other words, coming through in a way where they're showing a temporary worker, you know, pass, where they're not using coyotes to smuggle across, where they're not, you know, going through tunnels -- it's going to make it much easier for us to do our job. And that's enforce the border.



So I'm comfortable -- my judgment is people want this country secure. And we've got to do -- have a smart border, which we're in the process of developing now. It's a combination of fencing and technologies, UAVs, sensors.



I don't know if you've ever been down there. But it's a pretty vast part of the country down there. It's hard to enforce that border. You got some rugged country. You've got stretches of territory where you don't even know where the border is.



And you've got urban areas like El Paso or, you know, Southern California where people have been able to sneak in and -- by use of urban corridors.



And so, therefore, fencing makes sense there.



I went down to Arizona, the Arizona sector, and saw a place where there's literally neighbors abutting the border, and people would come -- you know, a hundred of them would rush across the border into a little subdivision and the Border Patrol would catch two or three and 97 would get in.



And they're asking: What are you going to provide to help us do our job?



And in this case, those who are in charge of coming up with the proper strategy to enforce the borders say we need double fencing with space so that the Border Patrol can use that fencing as leverage against people rushing into the country.



And my only point to you is that the strategy to develop this border requires different assets based upon the conditions, based upon what the terrain looks like. And that's what we're doing.



But I repeat to you: When you've got a situation where people are sneaking in to do jobs Americans aren't doing, it's also going to keep a strain on the border.



And so therefore, a temporary worker plan, to me, makes sense. and it's a much more humane program -- approach, by the way. It will certainly help stamp out all these illegal characters that are exploiting human beings; you know, these coyotes that stuff people in the back of 18-wheelers for money.



That's not in character with how this nation works. And I think we ought to -- I think a good program that helps us enforce our border also will see to it that people are treated more humanely.



Thank you for your interest.

    President Bush's News Conference, NYT, 11.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/washington/11transcript-bush.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Rice Asserts U.S. Plans No Attack on North Korea

October 11, 2006
The New York Times
By THOM SHANKER and WARREN HOGE

WASHINGTON, Oct. 10 — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Tuesday that the United States did not intend to invade or attack North Korea, but she warned the North’s leaders that they now risked sanctions “unlike anything that they have faced before.”

Even China, North Korea’s most important ally, said Tuesday that tough measures were in order, though its representatives said the punishments might not necessarily be the harsh ones that Washington was proposing.

“For China, we need to have a firm, constructive, appropriate, but prudent, response,” said Wang Guangya, the country’s ambassador to the United Nations. “There have to be some punitive actions, but also I think these actions have to be appropriate.”

The United States, Britain and France all want a resolution drafted under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, which makes sanctions mandatory and poses the possibility of military enforcement.

While both China and Russia have spoken of the importance of taking serious action against North Korea’s reported nuclear test, they are traditionally against invoking Chapter VII and have not indicated whether they would end their opposition.

The United States wants agreement on sanctions this week. But even as the administration sought to push tough language into a Security Council resolution, the White House expressed doubts about the capacity of North Korea’s nuclear program, based on evidence that the reported test had a smaller yield than expected. [Page A10.]

Sanctions sought by the United States include international inspections of all cargo moving in and out of North Korea to detect weapons-related material. But that might prove difficult for China and Russia to accept, in part because their coastlines and borders would be affected.

The diplomatic moves came a day after administration officials responded with shock and outrage to an official announcement from North Korea that it had detonated a nuclear device.

In an interview on CNN, one of a series of television appearances, Secretary Rice stressed that “the diplomatic path is open” for the North, and that giving up its nuclear program would “lead to all kinds of benefits for North Korea.”

But she said the North’s decision to pursue its nuclear program meant that it would face “international condemnation and international sanctions unlike anything that they have faced before.”

The United States has imposed economic curbs on North Korea since the opening of the Korean War in 1950, though President Clinton lifted a few of them toward the end of his time in office, when relations seemed to be thawing.

Now, in its bid to tighten sanctions, Bush administration officials say, the United States is pursuing a two-track approach: trying at the United Nations to persuade other countries to cut off economic ties with the North, and using American banking laws to punish banks overseas that deal with North Korean companies.

At the United Nations on Tuesday, Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States, plus Japan, met twice to work out differences on the sanctions proposed Monday by the United States. John R. Bolton, the American ambassador, reported the group was making headway and would meet again Wednesday.

“I think there is convergence on many issues, more than I would have predicted perhaps a day or two ago,” Mr. Bolton said. “That’s not to say we’re there by any stretch of the imagination, but I’m pleased by the positive nature of the discussions and look forward to more progress tomorrow.”

Mr. Bolton said he had discussed the proposal for North Korean ports separately with Mr. Wang, the Chinese envoy.

As for Russia, Mr. Bolton began the day complaining that Vitaly I. Churkin, the country’s ambassador, had arrived at the morning session with no instructions from his government. He said it had left “a hole” in the conversations.

But after the afternoon session, he said Mr. Churkin had heard from Moscow and was able to take part in the debate. “We’ll have some areas to discuss there and he raised some issues we had not thought of entirely, but by and large his comments were supportive,” Mr. Bolton said.

Mr. Churkin left without making any comment.

Mr. Bolton declined to discuss specifics of the talks but said one amendment suggested by Japan — a ban on travel by members of the North Korean government — had attracted particular support.

Asked if he would limit the American demands in the interests of speeding the process of drafting a resolution, he said: “We want firmness and swiftness, and I think we can have both. That’s our objective.”

In television interviews and briefings for reporters, Secretary Rice and other officials reiterated past assurances that the United States was not moving toward occupying North Korea or toppling its government.

She said the administration’s policy was still that the diplomatic path would be multilateral, through the stalled six-party talks, and not the two-way dialogue that North Korea has sought with the United States.

But even as the administration sought to unify its international allies, there were signs of fissures among Republicans over whether Washington should negotiate directly with North Korea.

Representative Heather Wilson, a New Mexico Republican and former Air Force officer who has played a leading role on national security issues, advocated bilateral negotiations, within the context of the six-party talks. “The idea here is to open a path for this rogue regime to walk back from the edge of the ledge,” she said. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with straight, tough talk with countries that are not our friends.”

In the administration’s quest for tough sanctions, much of the effort is focused on China, Japan and especially South Korea, which supply most of North Korea’s imports and investments. Indeed, South Korea has invested heavily in the Kaesong Industrial Park, an economic enclave in the North that employs thousands in factories that produce shoes, cosmetics and other export goods.

The United States has tried, without much success, to get South Korea to limit its involvement in the enclave, arguing that North Korean financial institutions that are involved in it are also involved in illicit activities. In the wake of North Korea’s latest nuclear steps, persuading South Korea may be easier, American officials say.

The unilateral drive by the United States is likely to expand on existing efforts that American officials maintain have already had a damaging effect on North. Indeed, the sanctions may have propelled North Korea to walk away from negotiations on its nuclear program and test a weapon, some experts say.

Now, with the enactment of American laws and executive orders after Sept. 11, 2001, new tools have become available, and they are likely to be expanded in coming weeks.

Under the U.S.A. Patriot Act, signed into law shortly after the 2001 attacks, the United States labeled a bank in Macao, Banco Delta Asia, as a “primary money-laundering concern” and declared that any bank doing business on American soil — virtually every big bank in the world — could not do business with it.

Administration officials say the ban on Banco Delta Asia badly disrupted North Korean activities, effectively froze the personal accounts of North Korean leaders and sent a message throughout the international financial system that the United States was prepared to do more.

Backing up that threat, President Bush has accused several North Korean trading corporations of being involved in nuclear proliferation and missile activities, often in conjunction with Syria, Iran and Pakistan. American officials have also visited banks in Europe, Asia and the Middle East to tell them that dealings with those entities could jeopardize ties with American banks.

The aim, according to Stuart Levey, under secretary of the treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, is to put the international community “on notice about a particular threat” and get them to voluntarily end their dealings with North Korean entities.

Thom Shanker reported from Washington and Warren Hoge from the United Nations. Steven R. Weisman, David E. Sanger and Sheryl Gay Stolberg contributed reporting from Washington.

    Rice Asserts U.S. Plans No Attack on North Korea, NYT, 11.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/washington/11diplo.html?hp&ex=1160625600&en=3a14ff5f465c9fc2&ei=5094&partner=homepag

Small Blast, or ‘Big Deal’? U.S. Experts Look for Clues

October 11, 2006
The New York Times
By DAVID E. SANGER and WILLIAM J. BROAD

WASHINGTON, Oct. 10 — The White House seized on further evidence on Tuesday that North Korea’s proclaimed nuclear test had resulted in a surprisingly small blast, questioning at one point whether the test was, in the end, “a big deal event.”

The White House spokesman, Tony Snow, appeared to backtrack from that assessment later in the day, as he turned from mounting a defense of the administration’s troubled history with North Korea to arguing that the only logical response to the test was to impose harsh sanctions.

The statements came as American intelligence analysts developed their first theories of what might have gone wrong in the barren mountains of North Korea’s northeast provinces to have produced an explosion much smaller than even North Korea had apparently expected.

The officials said that their current assessment was that North Korea had in fact detonated a nuclear device, and that they were discounting some reports that North Korea had staged a hoax, trying to disguise a large conventional explosion as a nuclear blast.

“The working assumption is that this was a nuclear explosion of some kind,” one intelligence official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “The conventional explosion theory doesn’t make a hell of a lot of sense, even for the North Koreans.”

But that left the mystery of why the explosion appeared to be so small, less than a kiloton, or a fraction of the explosions at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

Theories ranged from the possibility that North Korea had used old, polluted plutonium to the possibility that it had manufactured imprecise nuclear triggers. But at this point, intelligence officials said, they were just taking educated guesses, and would need hard evidence, or the testimony of spies or defectors, to figure out exactly what happened. The officials agreed to speak about the classified intelligence assessments only on condition of anonymity.

Intelligence officials said they had yet to determine the exact size of the weapon, or whether it was a plutonium bomb, the most likely scenario, given North Korea’s stockpile of spent nuclear fuel.

The Pentagon said it had dispatched planes carrying sensitive atmospheric sensors into international airspace along the North Korean coast, in hope of picking up a whiff of radiation vented from the test site. But so far, they said, none has been detected.

Mr. Snow contributed to some of the speculation at a morning meeting with reporters when he noted that North Korea began reprocessing nuclear fuel only two years ago — it was actually closer to three years, the North Koreans say — asking reporters, “Do you seriously believe that they have actually done everything within two years?”

“You could have something that’s very old and off the shelf here as well, in which case they’ve dusted off something that was old and dormant,” he added. “I don’t know.”

Mr. Snow later said “that was just me talking.” But he seemed to be suggesting that the North Koreans reached for plutonium believed to be produced in the late 1980’s or early 1990’s.

That first batch of North Korean plutonium is widely suspected by experts to have been contaminated with a high amount of plutonium 240, which can cause a chain reaction to start prematurely and end in a fizzle.

Thomas B. Cochran, a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington, a private group that tracks nuclear arms, said the plutonium 240 contamination problem was well known, and probably understood by the North Koreans.

More likely, he said, they had difficulty getting timers, detonators and explosives to work in the perfectly choreographed manner that was needed to compress the fuel uniformly — one of the technical requirements of building a plutonium bomb.

Philip E. Coyle III, a former head of weapons testing at the Pentagon and a senior adviser to the Center for Defense Information, a private group in Washington, said other explanations might be reasonable.

“Maybe they were trying to be sophisticated, and trimmed back on the amount of fuel” in trying to perfect a small warhead for missiles, he said. “Maybe they wanted a Ferrari the first time out of the box, and got a Model T instead.”

So, was it a big deal after all? Mr. Snow, reconsidering his original question, told reporters it was a “big deal in the sense that the North Koreans have, in defiance of the international community and their neighbors, said that they were going to test, and they have claimed to have tested a nuclear weapon. That is an important deal.”

Mark Mazzetti contributed reporting.

    Small Blast, or ‘Big Deal’? U.S. Experts Look for Clues, NYT, 11.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/washington/11intel.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Editorial

North Korea and the Bomb

October 10, 2006
The New York Times

Let us all agree: North Korea’s government is too erratic, too brutal, and too willing to sell what it has built to have a nuclear bomb. There is also no military solution, not least because intelligence experts haven’t a clue where Pyongyang has hidden its weapons labs or its stock of plutonium.

So after years of temporizing and denial, the world’s leaders need to figure out how to force this terrible genie back into the bottle. It is a truism that no country that has tested a nuclear weapon has ever been pressured or cajoled into giving it up. But neither has any nuclear postulant been as vulnerable to outside pressure and bribery as this regime.

The Bush administration seems to want to impose limited sanctions on North Korea — and inspections of all cargo going into and out of the country — until it agrees to abandon its entire weapons program. We fear that won’t be enough to quickly change Pyongyang’s mind — while key players like China won’t sign on to never-ending punishments.

We believe this must instead be a two-step process, starting with a Security Council-ordered ban on all trade, until the North agrees to stop expanding its arsenal. Pyongyang must be told that there will be no further attempt at negotiation until it halts all plutonium production, forswears additional tests and readmits United Nations inspectors.

In practice, the North Koreans are likely to back down only if China chokes off their oil supply and other essential trade. Until now Beijing has refused to use its enormous leverage, fearing that too much pressure could topple the North Korean government and unleash a mass of refugees over its border. When told they were enabling their neighbor’s nuclear ambitions, Chinese diplomats blithely insisted that the North was likely bluffing about having a weapon. Now, Washington, Tokyo, Moscow and others have to make clear that China will be judged by its willingness to confront this problem.

The Security Council must also make clear that it is still demanding the complete dismantlement of Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program. For that, negotiations are the only hope. It is impossible to know whether North Korea will give up its weapons at any price. But it has never been tested — mainly because the Bush administration has not made the sort of serious offer, including security guarantees, that might make a bargain worthwhile.

The administration has indulged in its own denial and temporizing. Last year, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice dismissed the North’s declaration that it had nuclear weapons as a bid for attention. “I do think the North Koreans have been, frankly, a little bit disappointed that people are not jumping up and down and running around with their hair on fire,” she told The Wall Street Journal.

Since then, United States policy has whipsawed between negotiations and posturing, incentives and sanctions. It has been months since negotiators even sat down at the table. Administration hawks suggested last week that perhaps the best thing would be for the North to test, so the world would know exactly what it was dealing with. The hawks appear to have gotten their way. So why don’t we feel safer?

    North Korea and the Bomb, NYT, 10.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/10/opinion/10tue1.html

News Analysis

For U.S., a Strategic Jolt After North Korea’s Test

October 10, 2006
The New York Times
By DAVID E. SANGER

WASHINGTON, Oct. 9 — North Korea may be a starving, friendless, authoritarian nation of 23 million people, but its apparently successful explosion of a small nuclear device in the mountains above the town of Kilju on Monday represents a defiant bid for survival and respect. For Washington and its allies, it illuminates a failure of nearly two decades of atomic diplomacy.

North Korea is more than just another nation joining the nuclear club. It has never developed a weapons system it did not ultimately sell on the world market, and it has periodically threatened to sell its nuclear technology. So the end of ambiguity about its nuclear capacity foreshadows a very different era, in which the concern may not be where a nation’s warheads are aimed, but in whose hands its weapons and skill end up.

As Democrats were quick to note on Monday, four weeks before a critical national election, President Bush and his aides never gave as much priority to countering a new era of proliferation as they did to overthrowing Saddam Hussein.

Mr. Bush and his aides contend that Iraq was the more urgent threat, in a volatile neighborhood. But the North’s reported nuclear test now raises the question of whether it is too late for the president to make good on his promise that he would never let the world’s “worst dictators” obtain the world’s most dangerous weapons.

“What it tells you is that we started at the wrong end of the ‘axis of evil,’ ” former Senator Sam Nunn, the Georgia Democrat who has spent his post-Congressional career trying to halt a new age of proliferation, said in an interview. “We started with the least dangerous of the countries, Iraq, and we knew it at the time. And now we have to deal with that.”

Mr. Bush’s top national security aides declined Monday to be interviewed about whether a different strategy over the past five years might have yielded different results. But Stephen J. Hadley, the national security adviser, has described the administration’s approach to North Korea as the mirror image of its dealings with Iraq. “You’ll recall that we were criticized daily for being too unilateral” in dealing with Saddam Hussein, Mr. Hadley said. “So here we are, working with our allies and friends, stressing diplomacy.”

But at the same time, he said the administration had made a conscious decision not to draw “red lines” in dealing with Kim Jong-il’s government because “the North Koreans just walk right up to them and then step over them,” just to show they can. Other aides say that, lines or no lines, the North simply decided to race for a bomb — and finally made it.

North Korea announced its nuclear breakout in early 2003, kicking out international nuclear inspectors and very publicly beginning its drive to turn its stockpiles of spent nuclear fuel rods into a small arsenal of weapons. Focused then on the coming war with Iraq, Mr. Bush and his administration chose to set no limits.

But foreign policy, as Mr. Nunn says, is “all about priorities,” and until Monday the closest Mr. Bush came to drawing a red line for the North was in May 2003, when he declared that the United States and South Korea “will not tolerate nuclear weapons in North Korea.”

The Central Intelligence Agency’s estimates in the years since have been that the United States has been tolerating exactly that — a small arsenal of nuclear fuel sufficient to produce six or more weapons.

Notably, Mr. Bush did not repeat that threat on Monday morning. Instead, he drew a new red line, one that appeared to tacitly acknowledge the North’s possession of weapons. The United States would regard as a “grave threat,” he said, any transfer by North Korea of nuclear material to other countries or terrorist groups, and would hold Mr. Kim’s government “fully accountable for the consequences of such actions.”

To critics of Mr. Bush’s counterproliferation policy, this seemed a recognition that the North had successfully defied American, Chinese and Japanese warnings about building weapons and testing them, and was now simply trying to manage the aftermath. North Korea, it appears, is taking a page from Pakistan’s strategic playbook: it exploded its first nuclear device in 1998, endured three years of sanctions, and now has emerged as a “major non-NATO ally” of the United States.

Mr. Bush’s aides say that if Mr. Kim believes he, too, can expect the world to impose a few sanctions and then lose interest in the issue, he is wrong. “He is really going to rue the day he made this decision,” Christopher R. Hill, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, said of Mr. Kim on Monday. But Mr. Bush’s critics charge that the threat may be empty. As they see it, Mr. Kim watched the Iraq war and drew a simple lesson: that broken countries armed with nuclear weapons do not get invaded, and do not have to worry about regime change.

“Think about the consequences of having declared something ‘intolerable’ and, last week, ‘unacceptable,’ and then having North Korea defy the world’s sole superpower and the Chinese and the Japanese,” said Graham Allison, the Harvard professor who has studied nuclear showdowns since the Cuban missile crisis. “What does that communicate to Iran, and then the rest of the world? Is it possible to communicate to Kim credibly that if he sells a bomb to Osama bin Laden, that’s it?”

Mr. Allison was touching on the central dilemma facing Washington as it tries to extract itself from the morass of Iraq. Whether accurately or not, other countries around the world perceive Washington as tied down, unable or unwilling to challenge them while 140,000 troops are trying to tame a sectarian war.

Divining North Korea’s true intentions is always difficult; there is no more closed society on earth. But the broad assumption inside and outside the United States government is that Mr. Kim’s first priority is the survival of his government. And the second is that without a nuclear weapon, he believes his government would have no way of staving off the larger, richer powers around it: China, Japan, South Korea and the United States.

All have fought over control of the Korean Peninsula in decades past, and to Mr. Kim’s mind, presumably, the prospect that the North could lash out is the only reason they have stayed at bay.

Mr. Kim may have calculated, many experts believe, that at this point there is little more that the Bush administration can do to him. The United States has imposed sanctions on his country since the end of the Korean War. The new crackdown on the banks through which the North conducts many of its illicit activities — counterfeiting, missile sales, trade in small arms — are being choked off, a step the North Korean leaders presumably see as part of a strategy of bringing them down.

It may be years, or decades, before historians know whether Iraq played into Mr. Kim’s calculations about when to conduct a nuclear test. But clearly, managing simultaneous crises around the world is straining the system in Washington, and posing the Bush administration with more direct challenges than many believe it can handle at one moment.

That returns Mr. Bush to the problem he faced when he came to office, and that his aides have never stopped arguing about: whether the best way to contain North Korea is to further isolate it, or to draw it out of its paranoid shell. The nuclear test may force Washington to pick a strategy.

    For U.S., a Strategic Jolt After North Korea’s Test, NYT, 10.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/10/world/asia/10assess.html?hp&ex=1160539200&en=4476571b6d74d04a&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Bush Rebukes North Korea; U.S. Seeks New U.N. Sanctions

October 10, 2006
The New York Times
By WARREN HOGE and SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 9 — The United States proposed tough new United Nations sanctions on North Korea on Monday after its reported test of a nuclear weapon, and President Bush warned the North that he considered its activity a potential threat to American national security.

At an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, the United States pressed for international inspections of all cargo moving into and out of North Korea to detect weapons-related material and a ban on all trading in military goods and services with the country.

At the White House, President Bush called the North Korean test “a threat to international peace and security” and condemned it as a “provocative act.”

But Russia and China, which have veto power and have consistently opposed tough sanctions, did not signal that they were ready to go along with the American proposal. Britain, France and Japan said they were also pressing for strong sanctions, which the Council is expected to debate in the coming days.

Coming just one month before the November midterm elections, North Korea’s reported test had immediate political ramifications. Democrats were already using their campaigns to argue that the war in Iraq had made the United States less secure by diverting attention away from threats like North Korea; now they are using the North’s claim to hammer away at their theme.

Mr. Bush also issued a pointed, albeit carefully worded, warning to the North not to export any nuclear technology it might have. In the past, North Korea has sold its weapons systems to other countries.

“The transfer of nuclear weapons or material by North Korea to states or nonstate entities would be considered a grave threat to the United States,” Mr. Bush said. “And we would hold North Korea fully accountable of the consequences of such action.”

The president has not used the phrase “grave threat” in the past with respect to North Korea, and analysts interpreted the remark as a signal that the White House was, in effect, raising the threshold on what kind of actions it would be willing to accept from the North, given that diplomacy has so far not worked.

“He has finally drawn a very clear red line, which is essentially: we know you have nukes, don’t even think about proliferating,” said Mike Chinoy, an expert in Korean security at the Pacific Council on International Policy, a research institution in Los Angeles.

“It’s kind of always been the unspoken administration red line,” Mr. Chinoy said, “because the reality is that, whatever the harshness of their rhetoric, the Bush administration has not been able to actually stop North Korea from staging this nuclear breakout.”

Democratic Party strategists quickly circulated a “talking points” memorandum to Democratic candidates, urging them to cast the reported North Korean nuclear test as “a colossal foreign policy failure of the Bush administration.” Several picked up on that theme.

Claire McCaskill, a Democratic candidate for the Senate from Missouri, convened a conference call with Richard Ben-Veniste, a member of the commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks, to talk to reporters about North Korea. Representative Harold E. Ford Jr., the Democratic Senate candidate in Tennessee, issued a statement to reporters, as did Senator Robert Menendez, the New Jersey Democrat in a tough re-election fight.

“Today’s nuclear test by North Korea confirms our worst fears and illustrates just how much the Bush administration’s incompetence has endangered our nation,” Mr. Menendez said in the statement, adding, “While George Bush bogged our military down to topple a regime that had no weapons of mass destruction, a brutal dictator in North Korea has strengthened a nuclear arsenal that has the potential to threaten the West Coast of the United States.”

Republicans were more muted in their reactions; Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican whip, issued a brief statement that did not mention Mr. Bush’s leadership at all, but simply called North Korea’s claim a “confrontational move designed only to destabilize the region.”

White House officials insisted that despite the talk of sanctions at the United Nations, the administration’s goal remains persuading North Korea to return to the six-nation talks and give up its nuclear program. Those negotiations have dragged on for more than two years with no substantive results, and North Korea left them 13 months ago.

Mr. Bush spent more than an hour on the telephone Monday morning in separate calls to leaders of the four nations, aside from the United States and North Korea, that are participating in those talks: Japan, China, South Korea and Russia.

Asserting Washington’s determination to protect Japan and South Korea, its principal allies in the region, Mr. Bush said the United States “will meet the full range of our deterrent and security commitments.”

He was careful to say that intelligence officials were still working to confirm North Korea’s statement about its test. But he said that “such a claim itself constitutes a threat to international peace and security.”

China, North Korea’s closest supporter and neighbor, called the action a “flagrant” violation of international opinion and said it “firmly opposes” North Korea’s conduct. Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, said his country “absolutely condemns” the test.

John R. Bolton, the American ambassador to the United Nations, reported that the 15 members of the Security Council were “solid” in deploring the North Korean move, and he said he hoped for swift action. But by Monday evening the Council adjourned its deliberations and set further meetings for Tuesday while, Mr. Bolton said, they received instructions from their capitals.

Richard A. Grenell, Mr. Bolton’s spokesman, said the United States was merging its suggestions with those from Japan and that a draft resolution was being composed on that basis.

In its 13-point proposal, the United States urged the Security Council to require North Korea to dismantle its nuclear program, suspend its building of ballistic missiles, freeze assets and transactions associated with the development of unconventional weapons, impose a ban on trade in luxury goods and prevent abuse of the international financial system, a reference to North Korean counterfeiting activities.

According to a draft amendment, the Japanese want to place additional restrictions on North Korean ships, aircraft and products, and prevent North Korean officials from being able to move outside the country’s borders.

Japan is also suggesting that the secretary general “actively engage in this matter.”

Earlier Monday, the Security Council formally nominated Ban Ki-moon, the foreign minister of South Korea, as the new secretary general, succeeding Kofi Annan when he retires Dec. 31. Mr. Ban had said in a Seoul news conference that he intended to make peace on the Korean Peninsula a high priority.

Mr. Bolton said the new resolution ought to be drawn up under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, which makes sanctions mandatory and militarily enforceable.

It is a procedure that China and Russia, both permanent members, traditionally resist. It was eliminated from the resolution passed in July condemning North Korean missile launchings.

While Wang Guangya, the Chinese ambassador, said Beijing condemned the North Korean action, which it had warned North Korea against taking, he turned aside questions on whether China would now support a sanctions resolution.

He said only that the Council should “react firmly, constructively and prudently,” adding that “the door to solve this issue from a diplomatic point of view is still open.”

Vitaly I. Churkin, the Russian ambassador, also declined to state whether Moscow’s view on sanctions had changed. “I think the North Koreans will be facing a very serious attitude on the part of the Security Council,” he said, without elaborating.

Moscow and Beijing would be particularly affected by the American call for border inspections of shipments in and out of North Korea since the borders involved are theirs.

Warren Hoge reported from the United Nations, and Sheryl Gay Stolberg from Washington.

    Bush Rebukes North Korea; U.S. Seeks New U.N. Sanctions, NYT, 10.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/10/world/asia/10korea.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

U.S. Cites Deal With U.N. Members to Punish Iran

October 7, 2006
The New York Times
By PHILIP SHENON

LONDON, Oct. 6 — The United States said it had won agreement on Friday from the other four permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and Germany to seek sanctions against Iran over its refusal to shut down a nuclear enrichment program that could be used to build bombs.

While the State Department praised the agreement, which was reached at a one-day meeting here of senior officials from the six nations, American diplomats conceded that there could still be long and difficult negotiations over what penalties to impose and their timing.

Indeed, none of the other nations here — Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia — issued such an explicit statement after the meeting. In the past, China and Russia have both said they would be wary of sanctions against Iran, despite its defiance of international demands to end nuclear enrichment.

R. Nicholas Burns, the American under secretary of state for political affairs, said after the meeting that whatever the other nations’ diplomatic language, “What we’ve got is an agreement to go to the Security Council” to punish Iran.

In essence, Mr. Burns said, the six nations “concluded that Iran is not prepared to negotiate with us” based on conditions set last spring, and that “we’ll go forward with sanctions.”

But he admitted the issue was far from decided. “I think there’s going to be a spirited debate about what kind of sanctions should be agreed to.”

Mr. Burns was the senior American negotiator at the talks for the most of the day because Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who traveled here from Iraq, was delayed when her military jet — and its replacement — developed mechanical problems, stranding her in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil for about two hours.

The German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who attended the London meeting, may have come closest to the American statement when he told ZDF television on Friday that “if there is no new decision from inside the Iranian leadership, there is at present no alternative to having the Security Council deal with this conflict.”

Agence France-Presse quoted the French foreign minister, Philippe Douste-Blazy, as saying that the six nations have “decided, in a unified manner, to work together in the next few days to speak about proportionate and reversible sanctions.”

The debate over Iran’s nuclear program is being conducted while the United States weighs a broad list of new sanctions to bring against North Korea, if it follows through on its threat to carry out a nuclear test.

Like his North Korean counterparts, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran has said he will not be intimidated by the possibility of economic and military sanctions. “This nation will not be frightened by the threats,” Iran’s state-run television quoted him as saying Thursday.

Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful uses, but the United States says it is a cover for making nuclear weapons.

A senior State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Friday that as a result of the London meeting, senior diplomats from the six countries would talk next week by video conference to begin debating the list of sanctions on Iran.

The official said that the United States and other nations would work from a two-page “menu” of potential penalties that was drawn up earlier this year, and that the sanctions would be ordered in stages.

“The agreement we have is that we will begin a series of graduated sanction measures against Iran, and that we’ll start with sanctions directed at Iran’s nuclear industry,” like limits on the import of so-called dual-use technology and on the travel of scientists and bureaucrats involved in the Iranian nuclear program.

The London meeting was called after the European Union foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, acting on behalf of the six nations, reported this week that he had reached a stalemate in negotiations with the Iranians over curtailing their nuclear program.

The British foreign secretary, Margaret Beckett, praised Mr. Solana and said there were “two paths ahead” — a negotiated end to Iran’s enrichment program, or sanctions — and “we regret that Iran has not yet taken the positive one.”

While Ms. Rice’s transportation troubles in Iraq meant that she had little chance to participate in Friday’s negotiations in London, she said she would be actively involved next week in talks over the next step with the Iranians.

“When the diplomatic course is not going to produce an outcome, then the other path has to be pursued,” she said. “I think we’re getting pretty close to that time.”

“The United States has always said that this can’t go on endlessly, and we are already more than a month past the deadline,” she added, referring to Iran’s failure to abide by the Aug. 31 deadline set by the United Nations for suspension of the enrichment program.

    U.S. Cites Deal With U.N. Members to Punish Iran, NYT, 7.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/07/world/middleeast/07iran.html?hp&ex=1160280000&en=f2b72839e80e76fb&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Editorial

North Korea and the Dominoes

October 6, 2006
The New York Times

Here’s a scenario to keep you up nights. North Korea tests a nuclear weapon, and Japan, South Korea and Taiwan start thinking they need one too. Meanwhile, over in the Middle East, Iran’s neighbors start asking themselves why they should even wait for Tehran to go nuclear before starting their own programs.

Which is why the Bush administration, and other critical players, need to do a lot more to talk North Korea back from the nuclear ledge — and to keep it there.

It has been months since negotiators even sat down at a table. And the two countries with the most potential leverage — China and the United States — have found it easier to play down the urgency of the threat than to do what’s needed to deal with Pyongyang’s undeniable craziness.

In China’s case, that means delivering an unambiguous warning to its longtime client that a nuclear test will be followed by an immediate and painful reduction in Chinese subsidies and aid. And President Bush will have to make his own unambiguous commitment that the United States will not try to overthrow the North Korean government — if it gives up its weapons program.

Experts still debate whether China got the North Koreans to the table by briefly cutting off oil deliveries — or doling out cash. There’s no doubt China has the leverage. But China’s autocrats are so enamored of any status quo — and so nervous about having to house and feed the North’s refugees — that they have resisted using it. Instead, Chinese officials say that the North probably hasn’t built a weapon, or if it has, wouldn’t ever use it. That’s what we call being in denial. It is a luxury Beijing can no longer indulge.

Mr. Bush cannot indulge his own ambivalence over whether it would be better to negotiate with Kim Jong-il or try to overthrow him. North Korea may have the most erratic, brutal and opaque leadership in the world. And it’s impossible to know whether the “dear leader” would really trade away his weapons program for any price. But this White House has yet to test him. In the most recent whipsaw, Mr. Bush agreed to offer economic and security incentives to Pyongyang but then undercut the offer by imposing new sanctions on North Korean banks. Pyongyang has refused to come back to the table ever since.

While you’re contemplating nuclear dominoes, here’s another reason to stay up at night. In its search for cash, North Korea has become expert at selling pretty much anything to anyone: counterfeit dollars, bootlegged cigarettes, ballistic missiles. Can plutonium be far behind?

The dangers are very real. What’s needed now is real pressure and real diplomacy to get the North out of the nuclear weapons business — preferably before a nuclear test shows potential buyers just how well its weapons work.

    North Korea and the Dominoes, NYT, 6.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/06/opinion/06fri1.html

U.S. Weighs Sanctions Against North Korea

October 6, 2006
The New York Times
By DAVID E. SANGER

WASHINGTON, Oct. 5 — The Bush administration is developing an extensive list of possible new sanctions against North Korea in the event that it carries through with its threat to conduct a nuclear test, senior officials said Thursday.

The measures under consideration include renewing efforts that have been unsuccessful in the past — persuading South Korea and China to cut off energy supplies and trade — and potentially confrontational steps that include intercepting and inspecting sea shipments into and out of the country.

Many of the sanctions have been considered before, as part of a long-running argument within the Bush administration over the best way to deal with North Korea. After a series of emergency meetings, including one on Tuesday at the White House, officials on each side of that debate said a nuclear test would end the argument about whether the United States should emphasize rewards or penalties.

“If the test happens, all the arguments are over,” said one senior official in the midst of the debate. “We’ll end up going to full-scale sanctions; the only debate is what ‘full-scale’ means.”

On Wednesday night, Christopher R. Hill, the assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs and a leading proponent of making new creative diplomatic offers to the North, announced that “we are not going to live with a nuclear North Korea.”

Administration officials concede that the United States has been living with a nuclear North Korea for years. But the fact that North Korea has not yet tested its weapons has created enough diplomatic ambiguity that President Bush has not had to confront how he would enforce his own declaration in 2003 that he would never tolerate a nuclear-armed North Korea.

American intelligence agencies have long declared that North Korea has produced the fuel for nuclear weapons, but in recent days, their briefings have also included an assessment based on the expectation that the North is likely to make good on its threat to conduct an underground test.

The briefings include the important caveat that such assessments are based more on an evaluation of the political environment and North Korean strategy than on physical evidence that a test is imminent. The briefings were described by several government officials, who said they did not forecast a specific timetable.

The question of sanctions is an enormously delicate one, which officials will not discuss on the record because the issue is still under debate. The officials who did discuss them, however, came from both camps in the administration, and they appeared unified in sending North Korea a warning that a test would galvanize Washington into actions that some administration hawks have proposed for years.

Mr. Bush, several officials said, planned to call the president of China, Hu Jintao, in coming days to urge him to send an emissary to North Korea to deliver a sharp warning about the consequences of a test. They said Mr. Bush was also planning to call other leaders in the region.

Frederick Jones, a National Security Council spokesman, would only say, “Our objective is to try to use our influence, and the influence of others, to convince the North Koreans that they should not test a nuclear device.”

But American officials are clearly concerned that the appeal to Beijing will not prove sufficient. “The last time the Chinese did this after the missile tests” that North Korea launched in early July, “their delegation was left cooling their heels for days,” one senior official said. Others cautioned that China always shied away from the ultimate sanction, cutting off the North’s oil, for fear that it could set off an economic or political collapse that would result in chaos along the border.

So for now the United States is seeking to win agreement on a “president’s statement” from the United Nations Security Council warning North Korea against a test. But the threatened test comes as the administration is already trying to persuade the Security Council to make good on its threat to impose sanctions against Iran for defying a call for it to suspend uranium enrichment. That situation is the subject of a meeting in London on Friday that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will attend.

Some American officials are concerned that adding North Korea to the list of countries the United States wants punished could complicate those efforts and fracture a fragile coalition. But the under secretary of state for political affairs, R. Nicholas Burns, said in a telephone interview on Thursday that he did not believe the Council was growing either weary or leery of threatening sanctions.

“You haven’t heard a single country support the North Koreans this week,” Mr. Burns said. “And we have made it very clear that should they test, we will work for a Chapter VII resolution at the Council,” a reference to the section of the United Nations Charter that declares a country’s act to be a threat to peace and security, and can pave the way for retaliation.

The potential sanctions against North Korea are described in a series of classified options papers that have been circulating among senior administration officials.

The proposed sanctions, which are graduated, could begin with a significant tightening on economic transactions — a process that began last year with action against a small bank in Macao that is widely believed to have handled transactions for President Kim Jong-il and other leaders, and that American investigators say was involved in money laundering.

A more escalated measure would involve inspection of all shipping, using a provision of a Security Council resolution passed after the July missile tests that allows nations to block missile or missile-related transactions.

But the reality is that North Korea receives most of its goods over the Chinese and Russian borders. Kurt Campbell, a former Defense Department official who specializes in Asia and is now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said, “Without leveraging the Chinese to put firm pressure on, very little can be accomplished by the U.S. through sanctions.”

    U.S. Weighs Sanctions Against North Korea, NYT, 6.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/06/world/asia/06nuke.html

Rice: U.S. Eying Ways to Aid Palestinians

October 5, 2006
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:41 a.m. ET
The New York Times

JERUSALEM (AP) -- Providing more humanitarian relief and freer movement across borders are ways the U.S. may be able to help improve the lives of Palestinians, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said after meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

The top U.S. diplomat said Wednesday that she hopes to revitalize and expand agreements made last year to help people and goods move with fewer restrictions across the borders with Israel and Egypt. Although she said she would like to increase resources for humanitarian relief, Rice made no specific pledge of U.S. aid.

''Those are the kinds of on-the-ground things that make it easier for the Palestinian people,'' Rice said.

A senior State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity because Rice's discussion with Abbas was private, said the United States supports an expansion of Abbas' security force, the presidential guard, as part of a multimillion-dollar plan to strengthen and streamline overlapping Palestinian security forces.

Abbas is trying to resolve a nine-month political stalemate with Hamas radicals who control part of the Palestinian government. At the same time, the United States has been trying to prompt Arab countries to increase their financial support for the Palestinians.

Rice is in the Middle East this week to drum up Arab support for the moderate Abbas and to test ways that the United States and other powers might help from afar. The United States hopes that Abbas will benefit from any ease in the rising tension and hardship in the territories, but the United States is also worried that the situation could spin out of control.

Underscoring the gulf remaining with the militant group Hamas, which controls the Palestinian Authority, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh accused the U.S. of trying to ''rearrange'' the Middle East for its own purposes.

Rice ''cares only to rearrange this region and to rearrange the Palestinian scene in a way that serves the American and Israeli agenda,'' Haniyeh, a Hamas member, said in Gaza City.

Rice is putting gentle pressure on Israel to loosen what Palestinians claim is a blockade of their separate territories in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The territories are not economically viable without extensive trade across their borders with Israel and Egypt and without the daily passage of Palestinians to jobs elsewhere.

''We are very concerned, of course, about the humanitarian conditions in the Palestinian territories, about the economic situation,'' Rice said.

''We understand that some of the economic hardships are of course caused by the lack of mobility, the lack of movement and access, and I will of course see what I can do to make sure that some of those crossings are indeed open longer and more frequently so that economic activity can return,'' she said.

    Rice: U.S. Eying Ways to Aid Palestinians, NYT, 5.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Rice.html

U.S. Sternly Warns North Korea Not to Conduct a Nuclear Test

October 5, 2006
The New York Times
By DAVID E. SANGER and JIM YARDLEY

WASHINGTON, Oct. 4 — The Bush administration sent a direct message to North Korea on Wednesday warning it not to set off a nuclear test, and later declared that the United States “is not going to live with” a nuclear-armed North.

The statement came in a speech late Wednesday by Christopher Hill, the assistant secretary of state for Asia. “We are not going to live with a nuclear North Korea, we are not going to accept it,” he said, according to Reuters. He was speaking at the newly created U.S.-Korea Institute, which is part of Johns Hopkins University.

Mr. Hill did not suggest what the American response would be, and gave no hit of economic or military response. But in the speech on North Korea, he said: “It can have a future or it can have these weapons. It cannot have both.”

Mr. Hill’s comments were in sharp contrast to Washington’s muted initial reaction on Tuesday to the North Korean announcement that it would set off an underground test. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said a test would be “provocative,” and the National Security Council released a statement saying that it would ’’severely undermine our confidence in North Korea’s commitment to denuclearization.’’

Mr. Hill said the direct message to North Korea, delivered to its mission at the United Nations, was in keeping with Tuesday’s responses.

Some inside the administration complained that the responses were so soft that North Korea would read them as an invitation to proceed.

Meanwhile, American officials were pressing China to intervene, though it is unclear how much influence Chinese authorities have; Beijing asked the North not to conduct a missile test in July, but it did so anyway.

On Wednesday, China urged North Korea to exercise restraint and pursue a course of diplomacy rather than “taking actions that may intensify the situation.”

That message was a clear statement of disapproval from the country considered North Korea’s strongest regional ally as well as its chief economic patron.

“We hope that North Korea will exercise necessary calm and restraint over the nuclear test issue,” China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Liu Jianchao, said in a statement on Wednesday.

China was host to the six-nation talks over the North Korea nuclear crisis until North Korea broke off the discussions a year ago because of a dispute with Washington. China has sought to bring both sides back to the talks with itself, Japan, South Korea and Russia, but North Korea’s announcement on Tuesday about plans to conduct a nuclear test “in the future” has again raised tensions in the standoff.

In Russia, the foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, spoke with his South Korean counterpart, Ban Ki-moon, and “stressed the unacceptability” of a North Korean test, according to a statement. A test, the ministry’s statement said, “can only aggravate this situation.”

The Foreign Ministry in South Korea, one of the North’s biggest providers of aid, said a nuclear test could alter its policy of engagement, The Associated Press reported.

“If North Korea pushes ahead with a nuclear test, North Korea should take full responsibility for all consequences,” a spokesman, Choo Kyu-ho said, after South Korean security ministers held an emergency meeting, according to The A.P.

On Wednesday, Mr. Liu, the Chinese spokesman, focused on diplomacy as a solution and, in a statement aimed at North Korea, called on “all relevant parties” to “address their concerns through dialogues and consultations instead of taking actions that may intensify the situation.”

In a telephone conversation Wednesday evening, Mr. Hill said that he wanted to convince North Korea that it could not follow Pakistan’s model. Pakistan tested a nuclear weapon in 1998, endured three years of sanctions, and then emerged after the Sept. 11 attacks as a major American ally.

“This,” Mr. Hill said, “ain’t Pakistan.”

The timing of North Korea’s announcement comes at what had been a hopeful diplomatic moment in East Asia. On Wednesday morning, China announced that the new Japanese prime minister, Shinzo Abe, would visit Beijing on Sunday, the first official visit between leaders of the two Asian powers since 2001. Relations between the countries have deteriorated since then, largely over former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, a memorial honoring Japan’s war dead, including convicted war criminals from World War II.

Mr. Abe will then travel to South Korea to meet with President Roh Moo-hyun.

David E. Sanger reported from Washington, and Jim Yardley from Beijing. Steven Lee Myers contributed reporting from Moscow.

    U.S. Sternly Warns North Korea Not to Conduct a Nuclear Test, NYT, 5.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/05/world/asia/05korea.ready.html

Rice Arrives in Israel for Olmert and Abbas Talks

October 4, 2006
The New York Times
By PHILIP SHENON

RAMALLAH, West Bank, Oct. 4 — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said today that she was “very concerned” about living conditions for Palestinians and that efforts would be redoubled to improve them.

She also reiterated the Bush administration’s commitment to help Israel and the Palestinians move toward a process that would eventually result in a two-state solution.

Ms. Rice arrived in Israel today and then left for talks with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, in the West Bank after calling for an end to the new wave of bloodshed between Palestinian factions.

Her visit is intended to show support for Mr. Abbas after recent violence in which at least 10 Palestinians were killed and more than 100 were wounded in clashes between the two main factions, Hamas and Fatah. “I’ve been discussing with the president ways that we might be able to better address some of the great needs that are there with the Palestinian people,” Ms. Rice said at a joint news conference with Mr. Abbas.

“But more than that, how we can facilitate a dialogue, how we can facilitate discussions between Israel and the Palestinians about the key issues that really do relate to economic development, to the ability of the Palestinian people to move within their territory, to ways to end the violence, to ways to make possible a life for the Palestinian people that is not subject to the kind of daily humiliations that we know have been associated with the occupation,” she said.

State Department officials traveling with Ms. Rice said she was looking for modest if concrete methods of easing financial pressure on Mr. Abbas’s government, which found itself cut off from American and other Western aid after the Hamas victory in January.

Ms. Rice, who is scheduled to meet the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, later in the day, said she would press for an easing of travel restrictions on Palestinians. She said she hoped Mr. Abbas and Mr. Olmert would meet in the near future.

The violence between Palestinian factions has appeared to complicate Ms. Rice’s campaign this week to drum up support among Arab nations for Mr. Abbas in his struggle to form a unity government with Hamas that could be recognized by the United States.

The Bush administration has said that it would resume financial aid to the Palestinian Authority only if a Hamas-run government agreed to recognize the right of Israel to exist and to forswear violence. Hamas has rejected those conditions.

Today, Mr. Abbas said at the news conference with Ms. Rice that talks with Hamas on a government of national unity had broken down, and that there were no indications that the Hamas-led government would honor any peace agreements with Israel that the Palestinians had signed before Hamas was voted into power.

Before meeting Ms. Rice, Mr. Abbas said that he might choose to dissolve the Hamas-led government and that unity talks with the group had broken down.

"My constitutional powers, granted by the basic law, will be used in time," he said, according to Reuters. He was referring to a possible presidential edict to dissolve the government, the news agency said.

"The dialogue now does not exist," Mr. Abbas said, according to the report.

Gunmen linked to Mr. Abbas’s secular Fatah movement suggested Tuesday that there would be more violence and threatened to kill three senior leaders of Hamas, the militant Islamic group that won the Palestinian elections in January.

The gunmen, known as the Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, accused Hamas leaders of “sedition” and said they would be killed so “these filthy people can be made an example.”

The Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniya of Hamas, called Tuesday on Arab nations to withhold support from American policy in the Middle East, telling reporters in the Gaza Strip, “It looks like Ms. Rice is adopting the old law — divide and conquer.”

Ms. Rice began her latest Middle East trip with a stop on Monday in Jidda, Saudi Arabia, to meet with King Abdullah, and then went to Cairo for a gathering of Arab counterparts.

She has discussed an array of issues with Arab leaders, including the violence in Iraq and mounting concerns over Iran’s refusal to curtail its nuclear program. But she suggested at a news conference in Jidda that the trip would be centered on efforts to end the political and financial turmoil in the Palestinian territories, in large part by pressing Hamas to moderate its views toward Israel and to renounce violence.

“Clearly, Hamas cannot govern in a circumstance in which they cannot represent a responsible government before the international system,” Ms. Rice said, adding that she hoped the group’s leaders “would take up what I understand to have been many overtures” by Mr. Abbas.

She described the Palestinian Authority president as a “man who is committed to the agreements that the Palestinians have signed over the last decade or so.”

In Cairo, Ms. Rice’s first appointment was with Egyptian intelligence officials who have been involved in negotiations for release of an Israeli soldier captured in June by militants linked to Hamas. The Egyptian government has called for the soldier, Corporal Gilad Shalit, to be freed.

Greg Myre contributed reporting from Jerusalem, and Christine Hauser from New York.

    Rice Arrives in Israel for Olmert and Abbas Talks, NYT, 4.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/04/world/middleeast/05diplocnd.html?hp&ex=1160020800&en=710c24b298f1a267&ei=5094&partner=homepage

U.S. Urging Bigger Force for Abbas

October 4, 2006
The New York Times
By STEVEN ERLANGER

JERUSALEM, Oct. 4 — The United States is proposing to expand the presidential guard of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to 6,000 men from the current 3,500, as part of a $26 million plan to shore up Mr. Abbas’s position and reduce the security chaos in the Palestinian Authority, according to donors who have been briefed by Lt. Gen. Keith W. Dayton, Washington’s Security Coordinator for the Palestinians.

General Dayton is in talks with Mr. Abbas to reduce the number of overlapping Palestinian security services in order to create a single national police force, on the model of Italy’s carabinieri.

The Americans are pressing Israel and the Palestinians to agree by Nov. 1 on how to reorganize and reconstruct the Palestinian side of the main border crossing for goods shipped between Gaza and Israel, known as the Karni crossing.

Israel has often shut Karni because of security threats. General Dayton has proposed spending about $25.5 million to build a modern facility for checking and scanning trucks on the Palestinian side, with the goal of allowing up to 400 trucks a day to leave Gaza loaded with exports.

The Americans hope to have the new procedures working at Karni by early November, in time for the harvest, when Gazan farmers hope to ship consignments of cherry tomatoes, persimmons and other produce through Israel to markets in Europe.

These efforts are an important focus of the visit by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Israel and the Palestinian territories. She is looking for ways to improve the lives of Palestinians, to ease access for Gazans and to bolster President Abbas in his political struggle against Hamas, the militant group that won a legislative majority in January but refuses to forswear violence, to recognize Israel’s right to exist or to accept previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements.

General Dayton’s plan, the details of which were confirmed by American officials, calls for some 90 international monitors to work with the Palestinians, including an expanded Presidential Guard, in order, the plan says, “for Palestinians to take responsibility for security and increase Israeli confidence and trust.”

A donor briefed on the plan quoted General Dayton as having said the plan has received “tacit agreement” from the Palestinians, including from Hamas. Israeli officials have discussed the plan but have not yet approved it, an Israeli official said.

The American intention is that the Presidential Guard control the Karni crossing from Gaza, as it currently does at the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, and that international monitors work with them at each crossing.

There are European Union monitors stationed at Rafah, but they are threatening to leave, both because of Palestinian violations of customs rules and because of the Israeli army’s activities in Gaza, which has kept the crossing shut for most of the last few months. The European monitors are insisting first that Rafah be opened normally, and then that it also be opened for the shipment of exports from Gaza.

Because of congressional restrictions on aid to the Palestinian Authority while it is run by Hamas, which the United States, Israel and others regard as a terrorist group, General Dayton has approached international donors — countries and multilateral institutions — to provide the funds for overhauling the Karni crossing.

Because the Presidential Guard works directly for Mr. Abbas, who belongs to the Fatah political movement and not Hamas, it may be possible to use American funds for that purpose, American officials say, but a specific appropriation from Congress would be required. General Dayton is hoping that Washington will provide some $9 million.

The general’s plan estimates that $20 million will go to equip the Presidential Guard and $2 million to add to its numbers, with $4 million spent to build a training facility in Gaza and to complete one already under construction in Jericho in the West Bank.

General Dayton has assembled a team at the American Consulate in Jerusalem to solicit and receive contributions, to manage projects and to satisfy donors that their money is being used properly. Past problems with corruption have made some potential donors hesitant about contributing to projects in the Palestinian territories without safeguards on accountability.

    U.S. Urging Bigger Force for Abbas, NYT, 4.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/04/world/middleeast/05mideastcnd.html?hp&ex=1160020800&en=be12ba1bd18001e8&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Rice Urges 2 Palestinian Groups to Halt Violence

October 4, 2006
The New York Times
By PHILIP SHENON

CAIRO, Oct. 3 — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Tuesday for an end to the new wave of bloodshed between Palestinian factions as she prepared to travel to the West Bank to support the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.

“Innocent Palestinians are caught in this violence, and we call on all parties to stop,” Ms. Rice said. “The Palestinian people deserve calm.”

In fighting on Sunday and Monday, at least 10 Palestinians were killed and more than 100 were wounded in some of the worst fighting in recent years between Hamas and Fatah, the two main Palestinian factions.

Gunmen linked to Mr. Abbas’s secular Fatah movement suggested Tuesday that there would be more violence and threatened to kill three senior leaders of Hamas, the militant Islamic group that won the Palestinian elections in January.

The gunmen, Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, accused Hamas leaders of “sedition” and said they would be killed so “these filthy people can be made an example.”

Only scattered incidents of violence were reported Tuesday, and no casualties as of nightfall.

The week’s violence appeared to complicate Secretary Rice’s campaign this week to drum up support among Arab nations for Mr. Abbas in his struggle to form a unity government with Hamas that could be recognized by the United States.

The Bush administration has said that it would resume financial aid to the Palestinian Authority only if a Hamas-run government agreed to recognize the right of Israel to exist and to forswear violence.

Hamas rejects the conditions.

The Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniya of Hamas, called Tuesday for Arab nations not to support American policy in the Middle East, telling reporters in the Gaza Strip, “It looks like Ms. Rice is adopting the old law — divide and conquer.”

Secretary Rice began her latest Middle East trip with a stop on Monday in Jidda, Saudi Arabia, to meet with King Abdullah, before traveling to Cairo for a gathering of Arab counterparts. She is to leave Wednesday to see Mr. Abbas on the West Bank and to meet in Israel with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

She has discussed an array of issues with Arab leaders, including the violence in Iraq and mounting concerns over Iran’s refusal to curtail its nuclear program. But she suggested at a news conference in Jidda that the trip would be centered on efforts to end the political and financial turmoil in the Palestinian territories, in large part by pressing Hamas to moderate its views toward Israel and to renounce violence.

“Clearly, Hamas cannot govern in a circumstance in which they cannot represent a responsible government before the international system,” Ms. Rice said, adding that she hoped the group’s leaders “would take up what I understand to have been many overtures” by Mr. Abbas.

She described the Palestinian Authority president as a “man who is committed to the agreements that the Palestinians have signed over the last decade or so.”

In Cairo, Ms. Rice’s first appointment was with officials of the Egyptian intelligence services who have been involved in negotiations for release of an Israeli soldier who was captured in June by militants linked to Hamas. The Egyptian government has called for the soldier, Corp. Gilad Shalit, to be freed.

State Department officials traveling with Secretary Rice said she was looking for modest if concrete methods of easing financial pressures on Mr. Abbas’s government, which found itself cut off from American and other Western aid after the Hamas victory in January.

Secretary Rice said in Jidda that she hoped the Israelis would lift some travel restrictions now placed on Palestinians “because the economic situation in the territories is, of course, made very much worse if there is not the ability to move through some of the crossings.”

Greg Myre contributed reporting from Jerusalem.

    Rice Urges 2 Palestinian Groups to Halt Violence, NYT, 4.10.206, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/04/world/middleeast/04diplo.html

Bush Says U.N. Should Not Wait on Darfur

October 2, 2006
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 12:33 p.m. ET
The New York Times

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush said Monday the United Nations should send a peacekeeping force to the troubled Darfur region of Sudan as soon as possible without further delay.

''The United States can play an important role in helping us achieve our objective, which is to end human suffering and deprivation,'' Bush said as he dispatched special envoy Andrew Natsios to the region. ''In my view, the United Nations should not wait any longer ... .''

The Sudanese government has thus far resisted mounting international pressure to accept a U.N. peacekeeping force in Darfur. Bush contends the U.N. should deploy such a force anyway.

Natsios said he had been going to Sudan for 17 years and ''I know leaders in all regions of the country and I'm going to use those contacts and that history to move this process along.''

''I think what our objective is, is not just to have a temporary fix for two months, but to try to deal with the root causes of this so we don't have another fourth war in five years, should we end this one successfully,'' Natsios said in an Oval Office session with Bush and reporters.

    Bush Says U.N. Should Not Wait on Darfur, 2.10.2006, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-US-Sudan-Darfur.html