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Nov 24, 2010 07:59

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2010/11/24/42/0301000000AEN20101124003400315F.HTML

SEOUL, Nov. 24 (Yonhap) -- South Korea remains cautious about the possibility of bringing North Korea's deadly bombing of a front-line island to the U.N. Security Council for punishment, weighing its benefit and cost amid uncertainties about whether China and Russia will come on board.

Officials in Seoul have heavily denounced Tuesday's artillery attack on Yeonpyeong Island in the Yellow Sea as a violation of the armistice between the two Koreas, the U.N. Charter and other peace agreements. Two marines were killed and 18 others, including civilians, were wounded in the bombing.

The shocking daylight attack marked the first time North Korea has shelled South Korean soil and civilian areas since the 1950-53 Korean War. Pyongyang's provocations had so far been limited to maritime skirmishes or gunfights across their heavily armed border.

South Korea returned fire, but on a limited scale, apparently fearing the possibility of the clash expanding into a full-scale war that could wreck the bustling capital Seoul, less than 50 kilometers from the border, and wipe out the shining economic development the country has undergone since the Korean War.

On the diplomatic front, the serious nature of the attack immediately raised the possibility of referring the case to the U.N. Security Council for punishment of the provocative regime as in the case of the North's deadly sinking of a South Korean warship in March. But officials have expressed reservations about it.

"We haven't set our position on that yet," a foreign ministry official said of the possibility of a U.N. referral, speaking on condition of anonymity. "I think we have to do some calculations of the cost and benefit of that before making our position."

As in the case of March's ship sinking, China and Russia hold the key to any Security Council action. The two countries are among the five veto-wielding permanent members at the council, and have closer ties with North Korea than any other major nations.

Countries around the world strongly condemned Tuesday's attack, with U.S. President Barack Obama expressing outrage and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon denouncing the attack as "one of the gravest incidents since the end of the Korean War."

Japan, Canada, Britain, France and the European Union have issued similar denunciations.

But the reactions from Beijing and Moscow were markedly muted.

China's foreign ministry said the country is "concerned about the current situation" and that it hopes all sides will work for peace on the Korean Peninsula. But it stopped short of blaming the North.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reportedly denounced the attack, but the formal statement from his ministry did not criticize North Korea, only saying that Moscow views the case "with deep concerns" and that all conflicts should be resolved peacefully through political and diplomatic means.

On Tuesday night, South Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan called in the Japanese, Chinese and Russian ambassadors and asked for cooperation in dealing with the case. But officials said that China's ambassador, Zhang Xinsen, did not make any comments critical of North Korea.

The reactions were reminiscent of their responses after March's ship sinking. Despite repeated pleas from Seoul, China and Russia refused to back South Korea's effort to clearly denounce North Korea for the torpedo attack that killed 46 South Korean sailors.

As a result, the U.N. Security Council settled for a rather vaguely worded presidential statement denouncing the attack without pinpointing North Korea as the culprit. Pyongyang's ambassador to the U.N. at the time called the statement "a great diplomatic victory" for the country.

China is considered North Korea's last-remaining major ally that has provided food and energy aid to the impoverished nation as well as diplomatic support for Pyongyang. Experts say Beijing believes pushing North Korea too hard could create instability on the Korean Peninsula and hurt its economic growth.

At best, the Security Council statement was no more than a slap on the wrist for a rogue nation that has been under international condemnation for its nuclear ambitions, human rights abuses and other problems, raising questions whether it was worth the effort that South Korea put in to try to persuade China and Russia.

"The attack is an issue that the U.N. Security Council should take up as it violated the U.N. Charter and the inter-Korean armistice," said Yun Deok-min, a professor at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security. "But we should not expect too much from the Security Council as it's a sort of talk shop."

In New York, a senior North Korean envoy voiced opposition to a Council referral of the attack.

"It should not be discussed by the Security Council but should be discussed between the North and South," Pak Dok-hun, deputy chief of North Korea's mission at the U.N., was quoted as saying by foreign media.

Britain, which now holds the rotating presidency at the Security Council, is in consultations with other Council members, and South Korea will "carefully review" a referral while "monitoring the overall atmosphere," a senior official said on condition of anonymity.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 23 (Yonhap) -- U.S. President Barack Obama Tuesday condemned North Korea for the shelling of a South Korean island that killed two soldiers and wounded 18 others, pledging to soon hold joint military drills to reaffirm U.S. commitment to defend South Korea.

"We strongly condemn the attack, and we are rallying the international community to put pressure on North Korea," Obama said in an interview with ABC News. "We strongly affirm our commitment to defend South Korea as part of that alliance."

North Korea fired about 170 artillery rounds on Yeonpyeong Island and nearby waters, where the South Korean Navy was conducting a drill near the disputed maritime border in the Yellow Sea.

The attack came amid heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula since North Korea's alleged torpedoing of a South Korean warship, which killed 46 sailors in the Yellow Sea, in March, and its most recent disclosure of a uranium enrichment plant, which could produce material for nuclear warheads.

Upon returning from a trip to Indiana to visit a Chrysler auto plant, Obama called South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and "agreed to hold combined military exercises and enhanced training in the days ahead to continue the close security cooperation between our two countries and to underscore the strength of our alliance and commitment to peace and security in the region," Robert Gibbs, spokesman for the White House, said in a statement.

Despite objections from China, Seoul and Washington have held a series of joint naval drills in the Yellow and East Sea after North Korea's alleged torpedoing of a South Korean warship in March that killed 46 sailors.

In the phone call, Obama also pledged to "work with the international community to strongly condemn this outrageous action by North Korea and to advance peace and security in the region," Gibbs said.

Obama was awakened by National Security Advisor Tom Donilon at around 4 a.m. and briefed by aides at the Oval Office on the incident before he left for Indiana, Bill Burton, White House deputy press secretary, said, adding Obama also "attended a meeting of his senior national security team on the situation on the Korean Peninsula."

Speaking to reporters, Burton said, "The president is outraged by these actions. We'll be working with South Korea and the international community in coming days on the best way forward in securing peace and stability in the region."

Burton dismissed the shelling and the revelation of the uranium program as part of the North's traditional brinkmanship.

"North Korea has a pattern of doing things that are provocative," he said. "What North Korea needs to do is live up to their international obligations and make real progress in ending their illegal nuclear program."

Stephen Bosworth, a special representative for North Korea policy who visited Beijing earlier in the day on the third and last leg of a tour that included Tokyo and Seoul, said he met with Chinese officials and discussed the shelling as well as the uranium project.

"The subject did, of course, come up in my meetings with the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and I think we both share the view that such conflict is very undesirable," he told reporters in Beijing. "I expressed to them the desire that restraint be exercised on all sides, and I think we agree on that."

Bosworth said he and Chinese officials reconfirmed the need to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue through six-party talks involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia.

The nuclear talks have been stalled over U.N. sanctions for the North's nuclear and missile tests early last year and the sinking of the South Korean warship Cheonan. Pyongyang denies any role.

"We strongly believe that a multilateral, diplomatic approach is the only way to realistically resolve these problems," he said.

The envoy said in Tokyo earlier in the day, "We do not contemplate resuming negotiations while active programs are underway or while there is a possibility that the North Koreans will test another nuclear device or test a missile."

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon also condemned the attack as "one of the gravest incidents since the end of the Korean War." He called for "immediate restraint" and insisted that any differences be resolved "by peaceful means and dialogue."

Marine Col. Dave Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman, said the U.S. military is "still monitoring the situation and talking with our allies," adding, "At this point it's premature to say that we're considering any action."

Geoff Morrell, another Pentagon spokesman, told reporters that the U.S. takes the shelling "very seriously, just as we took the sinking of the Cheonan earlier this year very seriously in which the North murdered some 40 South Korean sailors."

Morrell said Defense Secretary Robert Gates talked to South Korean Defense Minister Kim Tae-young over the shelling.

"In a phone call this morning, Secretary Gates told Minister Kim the United States strongly condemns the attack by North Korea, views it as a violation of the armistice agreement and assured him that we are committed to South Korea's defense," the spokesman said. "He expressed sympathy for the loss of life and appreciation for the restraint shown to date by the South Korean government."

Morrell noted the difficulty of "piling more sanctions upon the North than are already there," saying, "This is a regime that is determined to bypass the sanctions, to not abide by its international obligations."

China is seen as key to implementing sanctions on North Korea as Beijing provides more than 80 percent of the food, oil and other necessities to the isolated, impoverished communist ally.

China has been lukewarm in sanctioning North Korea due to fears that instability would result in a massive influx of refugees across their shared border or a unified Korean Peninsula under South Korean and U.S. control.

Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, told MSNBC, "China, even though it's frustrated with North Korea, is essentially a country that prefers a version of the status quo to anything that could lead to dramatic change."

"They don't want to see a wave of millions of refugees come across the border," Haass said. "They do not want to set in motion a chain of events that would lead to a war and, ultimately, a unified Korea under the control of Seoul in the American political and diplomatic and security orbit."

He recommended Washington and its allies get tougher.

"What you need to do is retaliate when they do things like this, and you need to be prepared for something bigger," he said. "If they, for example, take any of their newfound nuclear capabilities and transfer them to a country like Iran or to any of the terrorist groups, we ought to be very clear that that would lead to our taking extraordinary military action, perhaps, seeking regime change."

Sen. Kit Bond (R-Mo) called on Beijing to put more pressure on Pyongyang.

"I would like to see them in a much more progressive and effective role in squeezing North Korea to get them back in the box," Bond told CNBC's "Squawk Box."

Mark Toner, deputy spokesman for the State Department, said the U.S. will work with China and other partners to the six-party talks on the North's provocations, but added, "We're going to take a measured and unified approach."

Paul Stares, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said he expects "an intensified diplomatic effort by the United States and China to contain this latest crisis and prevent such incidents from happening again."

"The United States will pressure China to rein in North Korea, emphasizing how much of a strategic liability it has become, while China will pressure the United States to lessen the military and diplomatic pressure that has been put on North Korea since the Cheonan incident," Stares said.

Bruce Klingner, senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, sees the recent provocations as "the North's strategic escalating pattern of provocations designed to force the United States and South Korea to abandon pressure tactics, including sanctions on the regime."

"This incident is also another reminder of the White House's misplaced priorities," Klingner said. "While Obama spends every waking second using Chicago-style tactics to press for ratification of the New START nuclear deal with Russia, North Korea is running amok," he said.

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