Talks still offer hope of stability on Korean Peninsula

After approval of UN Security Council Resolution 2087 strengthening sanctions on North Korea, Pyongyang announced that it would carry out a high-level nuclear test, after which US, Japan and South Korea issued tough messages. Denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula seems to hit dead end.

Obviously, it's almost impossible to solve the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue unless existing ideas are changed.

The escalating tension is in no one's interests. To turn the tables, each should strengthen contact and talk wisely and courageously with others. Further deterioration of the situation might be prevented through the following steps.

The first is the resumption of the February 29 agreement.

In the US-North Korea negotiations in Beijing on February 29, 2012, both sides reached an agreement that North Korea should halt nuclear tests, missile tests and the uranium enrichment program, as well as invite International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors to return, to check and supervise its suspension of enrichment and disabling of existing programs. The US also agreed to offer 240,000 tons of food aid.

For the US, this agreement helps prevent North Korea increasing nuclear capability and safeguards the stability of Korean peninsula. For North Korea, its international environment could be improved, and its state power can be stabilized.

But this win-win agreement was broken on March 16, 2012, when North Korea announced the launching of a satellite.

North Korea said that it did not violate the agreement because it launched a satellite, not a missile, while the US believed it was cheating, as the underlying technology was the same. And since US President Barack Obama faced an election at that point, critical voices in the US thought it was necessary for their government to take a tough stance on North Korea.

However, today things have changed, as Obama has already won his second term, and expert opinion in the US has swung toward favoring more contact with the North. Reviewing the agreement can offer an important chance to reduce tensions.

The second step is to push the establishment of a peace system on the Korean Peninsula. After the fourth round of the Six-Party Talks in September, 2005, discussion of a system to maintain peace was once heated but finally fruitless.

In January 2009, North Korea proposed the Korean Peninsula peace talks, the form of which was flexible because talks were within the framework of the Six-Party Talks, rather than only a US-North Korea meeting to sign a bilateral agreement as before.

If the sides involved sincerely pursue peace talks again, and reduce North Korea's sense of insecurity through more contact, they may be able to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear tests and return to the table of the Six-Party Talks.

The author is a researcher at China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations.