North Korea Nuclear Talks to Focus on Verification
六方会谈将商议如何验证平壤之言
Negotiators from six nations are preparing to meet in Beijing for talks on eliminating North Korea's nuclear programs. Discussions will focus on how to verify that Pyongyang is not hiding any nuclear materials or facilities.
After nine months on hold, negotiators from China, the United States, North and South Korea, Japan, and Russia will gather Thursday in Beijing for three days of talks.
Negotiations on steps to disarm nuclear North Korea were halted while Pyongyang prepared a declaration of its nuclear materials. It handed over the list last month, allowing talks to move forward.
China's lead negotiator in the talks, Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei, said Wednesday he is optimistic they will make progress.
中国参加这一谈判的首席人员是副外长武大伟,他星期三说,他对谈判将取得进展持乐观看法。
He says with the joint efforts of all the parties, the tree of the six-party talks is growing healthily, with its roots deepening, branches thickening and it has become very fruitful. He says they are going to have a meeting among heads of delegations and he hopes they can make the overall arrangements on how to implement the agreement reached in the second phase of the talks.
In the second phase, currently underway, North Korea must declare all its nuclear materials and facilities and disable its main reactor. In return, it is to receive fuel aid and some sanctions against it will be lifted.
The chief U.S. negotiator, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, says confirming North Korea's nuclear declaration and the disabling will be the main focus of the talks.
"Verification is the most important thing. We want to speed up the rate of disablement. Obviously the cooling tower is done, but we need to discharge the reactor," he said. "We hope we can pick up the pace to do that, and there's some other elements of disablement that we'd like to move more quickly on."
North Korea says it will not take further steps until it has received more of the promised aid and political incentives.
北韩说,它在尚未得到答应给它的援助及政治利益之前,不准备采取进一步行动。
Verifying the secretive government's nuclear disarmament will likely pose the biggest problem.
对行事隐秘的北韩政府进行的拆除核武装进行验证可能构成一个大问题。
Although the authoritarian state agreed last year to give up its nuclear ambitions, Washington thinks North Korea has a secret uranium enrichment program, in addition to its declared plutonium one, as well as several nuclear bombs. Neither the uranium program nor the bombs were on Pyongyang's declaration.
Some North Korea political analysts say Pyongyang is not likely to turn over all its materials and will probably ask for more aid.
一些北韩政治分析人士说,平壤不大可能交出本国所有的核材料,而且平壤可能还会要求更多的援助。
North Korea has for years relied on its nuclear build-up to squeeze aid from its neighbors and the United States.
北韩多年来靠本国的核武库向邻国及美国榨取援助。
The third and final phase of the agreement calls for Pyongyang to permanently dismantle all its nuclear facilities and hand over all nuclear materials.
有关协议的第三阶段、也是最后阶段要求平壤永久性地废弃本国所有的核设施,并交出一切核材料。
In return, the U.S. would establish normal diplomatic relations with the North and a permanent peace treaty for the 1950s Korean War could be signed.