US SECRETARY of State Hillary Clinton kept up pressure on North Korea yesterday during a visit to Seoul when she described the sinking of the South Korean corvette Cheonan as an “unacceptable provocation”, and said the rest of the world had to respond.
Tensions on the Korean peninsula have been ratcheted up since a report by a team of international investigators last week showed a torpedo from a North Korean submarine tore the Cheonan warship in two on March 26th, killing 46 South Korean sailors and inflaming public opinion there.
“This was an unacceptable provocation by North Korea and the international community has a responsibility and a duty to respond,” Ms Clinton said after her meeting with South Korean leaders. She said the incident, one of the South’s worst military disasters since the Korean War, required a “strong but measured response”.
In her efforts to avoid the situation sliding into open conflict, Ms Clinton was particularly keen to enlist China’s help in resolving the issue. Beijing has sound relations with both Koreas.
“There is a different path for North Korea, and we believe it’s in everyone’s interest, including China, to make a persuasive case for North Korea to change direction,” she told reporters in Seoul.
Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin discussed the issue with his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi at a meeting in Beijing yesterday. "Minister Yang said everyone needed wise heads and cool heads on this issue," said Mr Martin in an interview with The Irish Times.
China has said it was still evaluating the evidence, but Ms Clinton said she believed the Chinese were aware of how serious the issue was. “We expect to be working with China as we move forward in fashioning a response,” she said.
North Korea angrily denies the accusations and has responded with a fearsome bout of sabre-rattling. Pyongyang says it will cut off all communications with the South if it continues to blame the incident on North Korea.
There is little love lost between North Korea, which has turned in on itself since the 1950-53 war and become one of the world’s poorest countries, and South Korea, which has a flourishing democracy and is Asia’s fourth largest economy.
The South has said it will resume psychological warfare operations on the border, airing propaganda across the border by loudspeaker – a practice it ceased in recent years as ties seemed to warm. The North’s military said it would block cross-border traffic heading to a joint industrial zone in North Korea if the South does not stop these “psy-ops”, and promised it would blow up any loudspeakers which South Korea sets up to broadcast propaganda northward.
The next step is for the US and South Korea and other allies to consult members of the UN Security Council on what the appropriate action would be, but no one knows when that will happen. China is generally reluctant to impose sanctions on North Korea, often called China’s “Little Brother” because of their shared ideological and cultural links.