U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on China Friday to faithfully implement sanctions on North Korea, imposed by U.N. resolutions, for the North's nuclear and missile tests in the past years.  

In a speech at the State Department ahead of Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit here early next week, Clinton said, “Until North Korea demonstrates in concrete ways its intention to keep its commitments, China, along with the international community, must vigorously enforce the sanctions adopted by the Security Council last year.”

North Korea will be among major topics when U.S. President Barack Obama meets with Hu for a summit meeting and a state dinner Wednesday, U.S. officials have said, in what is being called the most crucial Sino-U.S. summit in decades due to China’s emergence as an economic and military power that will challenge U.S. supremacy.

Other issues high on the agenda include the revaluation of China's yuan currency, human rights, Iran's nuclear ambitions and improving bilateral ties.

“It is vital that we work together with China,” Clinton said. “We need to make it clear to North Korea that its recent provocations, including the announced uranium enrichment program, are unacceptable and in violation of not only Security Council resolutions, but North Korea's own commitments in the 2005 joint statement.”

The top U.S. diplomat was discussing North Korea’s shelling of a South Korean front-line island and the torpedoing of a South Korean warship last year that killed 50 people, including two civilians. The events have heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula to their highest level since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War.

A six-party deal signed in 2005 by the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia calls for the North's nuclear dismantlement in return for massive economic aid and diplomatic and political benefits. The talks, however, have been deadlocked for more than two years over the North's nuclear and missile tests and other provocations.

North Korea also revealed in November a uranium enrichment plant that could serve as a second way of building nuclear bombs in addition to its existing plutonium program, despite Pyongyang’s claims it is producing fuel for power generation.

“We have emphasized to our colleagues in Beijing that China, as a country with unique ties to North Korea and chair of the six-party talks, has a special role to play in helping to shape North Korea’s behavior,” Clinton said. “We have discussed this in depth with our Chinese friends -- that failure to respond clearly to the sinking of a South Korean military vessel might embolden North Korea to continue on a dangerous course. The attack on Yeonpyeong Island that took the lives of civilians soon followed.

That shelling brought into even sharper relief the acute threat posed by this kind of reckless behavior.”

Pyongyang in recent weeks has made a series of peace overtures.

In its most recent proposal for unconditional inter-Korean dialogue, the North on Monday called for a meeting of working-level officials later this month to prepare for possible ministerial-level talks.

Suspicious of the North's history of creating tensions to win economic aid, South Korea proposed that the sides hold talks to discuss the North’s shelling of Yeonpyeong Island and torpedoing of the Cheonan.

Seoul and Washington insist that Pyongyang apologize for the provocations before any resumption of bilateral or multilateral talks.

“We are building momentum in support of North-South dialogue that respects the legitimate concerns of our South Korean ally and that can set the stage for meaningful talks on implementing North Korea’s 2005 commitment to irreversibly end its nuclear program,” Clinton said.     

China, the North's staunchest ally, has called for an early, unconditional resumption of the six-party talks.

Clinton also expressed concerns over North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities.

“North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs are becoming a direct threat to the United States itself,” she said.

“So this is not just about peace and stability in Northeast Asia, nor standing with our allies; this is becoming, unfortunately, more of a national security challenge to our own shores.”

She was echoing Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who said in Beijing Tuesday that North Korea's missiles and nuclear weapons will pose a threat to the U.S. within five years. Gates also urged

North Korea to impose a moratorium on nuclear and missile testing  to help revive the six-party nuclear talks.

The chief U.S. defense official met with South Korean officials in Seoul earlier Friday in the third and last leg of his three-nation tour of Beijing, Tokyo and Seoul.

North Korea detonated nuclear devices in 2006 and 2009, and conducted long-range missile tests three times - in 1998, 2006 and 2009 - which were seen as a partial success.

Pyongyang is believed to have at least several nuclear weapons, with some experts saying it could have already developed nuclear  warheads small enough to be mounted on ballistic missiles with the help of China or Pakistan.



(Yonhap News)