Is the U.S. Moving Toward a Peace Treaty with N.Korea?
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters at a press conference on Thursday, “We are going to go with a very clear message that there are significant benefits to North Korea if they recommit to the verifiable, irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.” She added that the U.S. “would explore some of the issues which they have raised continually with us over the years; namely, normalization of relations, a peace treaty instead of an armistice, economic development assistance.” “All of that would be open for discussion,” she said. In the September 19 Joint Statement of 2005 and the February 13 Agreement of 2007, the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia agreed to hold separate talks over a permanent peace treaty on the Korean Peninsula, but this is the first time for a top U.S. diplomat to mention the peace treaty publicly. Until now, North Korea has been demanding a peace treaty as a precondition to giving up its nuclear weapons program. In a recent meet
