Roundtable With Journalists

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I'm off to Beijing tomorrow. I'm going to try to get something implemented. It's not going to be the whole September statement; it's probably just going to be a small part of the September statement. But our desire is to get something done on the ground. I know you want me to tell you what it is that we're going to do, but I don't want to tell you what it is. I want to sit down with the Chinese, the North Koreans, and others. And when we announce something -- if we announce something -- then we'll be able to talk about the elements. But if I tell you what I hope they are now, and if you compare that with what we actually announce, you'll say: "Well, what happened to X? We thought you were going to get X. Well, what happened to Y? What happened to Z?" It'll just look worse if I tell you things now that don't happen when we actually get the announcement. So if you've noticed me trying to keep the expectations low, there's a reason for that, because anytime you sit down with the North Koreans you really don't know what you're going to get.

So we did have some lengthy, substantive, and I would even say useful discussions in Berlin. They were based on elements, on ideas that we had worked out, especially in Hanoi, when we had a trilateral meeting with the ROK and Japanese counterparts. It was our hope in Hanoi that we would have been able to get some of these done in December. But instead the DPRK came to the meeting in December unwilling to change their position, which was that they needed everything resolved in BDA before they were prepared to negotiate. We didn't think that was the basis for negotiation. So even though it went four days, we frankly were a little disappointed with the results. I think we have a basis now, based on the conversations in Berlin, to go forward. I know you want to know why that's changed, and did the North Koreans make a concession. But I don't think it's helpful if I say, "yes, they made a concession" -- because then they will deny they made a concession., and I just don't want to make my job any more difficult than it already is. So I'm not going to talk about anyone making any concessions.

But I do want to emphasize the fact that if we do get something announced in Beijing, which I do hope we will, that people should see this only as a first tranche. And that if it's a first tranche, then if we’re able to move on to a second and third tranche, and to get on with the overall goal -- and to achieve our goal of the complete implementation of the September statement -- then this first tranche will be a great success. And we'll be able to look back on it and say that was a success; that was a turning point. But if it turns out to be the only tranche, the first and only tranche, then it will be a great failure.

So, in short, I don't think one can judge it as a success or failure this week. I think one has to wait and see whether other tranches follow. That is the very difficult task that we face. The North Koreans are a country that has thrived on its isolation. They seem to thrive in a political sense on this isolation. Economically, I think they have been greatly harmed by this isolation. But they seem to enjoy the status of being so isolated. And in the process of being isolated, they sometimes have difficulty working with others and achieving common objectives with others.

So as we work with them in a negotiating context, I think for them it's sometimes very difficult to understand what is needed to be done. So I go into these talks with a sense of some expectation based on the consultations we had. I feel a sense of optimism in the sense that we have -- the U.S. and Japan and ROK are working very well together. That hasn't always been the case, but I think it is very much the case in recent months. I would say it has been very helpful to the Six-Party process that the Japanese Prime Minister reached out to Korea early on in October to try to improve that relationship. And I think that improvement has paid dividends for us in the Six-Party process. I go with some sense of optimism also derived from the fact that the Chinese have worked well with us and absolutely share our goal. And even though they share -- they want to achieve the same goal of reaching the top of the mountain, sometimes they'll take a different path to the mountaintop. But at least we all agree on where we're supposed to meet: at the top. So I think there's a reason to be optimistic there. But the big question will be whether the DPRK understands the need to begin this process of denuclearization.

So, I'd be happy to take some questions.

QUESTION: My name is Ogura from the Mainichi Newspaper. It has been reported that Pyongyang demanded that the international community annually provide more than 500,000 tons of fuel oil. Do you think it's possible for you to accept this demand?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don't know. I mean, I saw this demand in the newspaper. I did not talk energy with the North Koreans in Berlin. I'm not sure what it refers to. We need to hear directly and then see what this is all about. So I find it difficult to comment on press reports. Let me just get to Beijing. You can ask me after I've been in Beijing. If I reacted to every press report out of Pyongyang, I wouldn't last very long.

QUESTION: My name is Yoshitake. I'm from the Asahi Shimbun. I'm Tokyo-based. I understand that the Japanese Government has almost ruled out energy support to the DPRK if they don't have any progress on the abduction issue. Do you think it's possible to have a provision for energy support without Japanese support?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, we have a September statement that envisions a number of things, including economic and energy assistance. But we also have a September statement that envisions a bilateral process between North Korea and Japan. And it seems to me that we should try to have a situation where this issue of the abductions, that we can find a mechanism for addressing that and therefore in addressing it to somehow create -- gaining some information about it and I think helping the families of these abducted people. So I think we do need to make sure that this provision of the September statement -- that is, of Japan and North Korea having a bilateral process for dealing with outstanding issues -- that this is established.

Now I'm not prepared to say when this provision of the September statement would get implemented, whether it will be this week in Beijing; I just don't know. But I think everybody involved knows the importance of the abduction issue for the Japanese Government and for the Japanese people, really. So we have to find a way to address this. I might add that it's not just the Japanese Government that has raised this issue. The United States -- I personally have raised this issue with the North Koreans. I know that other delegations also have raised it. It's a part of the reality of dealing with this, with trying to address the landscape of problems in Northeast Asia.

I've said this before, but I believe the Six-Party process really gives us a broad, strong platform for dealing with a number of these issues -- the main one being denuclearization. And by the way, that's an enormous issue of great importance for the Japanese people. But also the Six-Party process creates a platform for dealing with other issues, including these historical issues, including abductions. So let's see what we can do on that.

QUESTION: I'm Nishida from Sankei Shimbun. It seems that North Korea is very interested in another Agreed Framework. But I think you are not interested in only freezing but are interested in complete denuclearization.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I hope you took notes on my previous comments.

QUESTION: Yes, I know. But you won't completely exclude the possibility of a kind of agreement before reaching a final agreement. I don't say it's an Agreed Framework, but kind of a...

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, we need to implement the September agreement. We need to implement it in full, and that means 100% implementation. The main element of the September agreement -- the September 19, 2005 agreement -- is of course denuclearization, so we need that fully implemented.

Now, can we do it all at once? Can we jump this mountain in one step? Probably not. Probably we're going to have to do this in several steps, or tranches, or sets of actions. So my point earlier was don't judge what we're doing by the first step. But if it turns out that first step is the only step, then you have a right to judge it, and you can judge it as a failure. But any first step we take is just a first step. But we are not going to make this journey in one step. It's going to take more than one step. It's going to take probably several steps to get there.

But for people who -- You know it's funny how the Agreed Framework is a very emotionally laden term for people who worked very hard on the Agreed Framework and are very proud of it. And I tell you, I've worked on peace processes in the past -- some successful and some not successful. I worked very hard on Bosnia, which was successful. I worked very hard on Kosovo, which was not successful. And I was no less proud of the work I did on Kosovo, even though it was not successful, because I did my best. I really did. So the people who worked on the Agreed Framework, I understand why this is important for them that their contributions not just be dismissed as some sort of failure and forgotten and their efforts belittled. So I understand why they feel very strongly about it. And I don't think it's in my interest or anyone's interests just to denigrate, to dismiss those efforts as somehow being naïve or wrongheaded. So I understand that.

On the other side, you have people who worked very hard to do away with the Agreed Framework and to say that the Agreed Framework was not a successful way to approach the problem. So they feel very strongly as well. And so when they look at any first step, they will be making sure it doesn't look like the Agreed Framework, because they've spent a lot of time pushing the Agreed Framework away; so they don't want to see it back. All I can tell you is, whatever we do in this first step should not be judged as the Agreed Framework or anything else. It should just be judged as its first step. And I would just ask people to withhold their judgments until they see the second step and the third step. And if they never see a second step or a third step, they have a right to criticize -- because to take just one step in this process would not be a success, and I know that.

I'm sorry to go on too long about that.

QUESTION: My name is Ryoichi Nishida. I'm writing for Sankei Shimbun, a Japanese daily. Knowing fully that you are quite hesitant to go into details . . .

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: It's more than "hesitant." I refuse.

QUESTION: Recently, you used the word, the expression "tranche," again and again. Could you further elaborate on that? How do you define the first tranche?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, by "tranche" -- T-R-A-N-C-H-E -- I think it's a French word or something -- I mean "set of actions." And “first tranche,” I would say, "set of initial actions." Now it will not just be one action; there will be a set of actions. And there will be things that various participants have agreed to do to be determined in Beijing. So "tranche" refers to the notion of several different actions put together in a sort of initial package.

By the way, we also use the term "early harvest," which is an agriculture metaphor, of course, where you have an overall harvest, or you have an overall planting, but some little plants come up and you harvest those immediately. That's your early harvest. I thought it was a very nice metaphor. But the North Koreans, I guess, don't like agricultural metaphors, maybe because they've had too many harvest failures. So I think we'll use more bureaucratic terms like "tranche" and "actions" and "initial" and things like that.

QUESTION: So welcome to Japan.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Welcome to Japan? Thank you very much.

QUESTION: So my name is Arita from Kyodo. So I'm wondering where you set the goal for the next round. Can you be satisfied with just words of commitment by North Koreans in the next round?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: No.

QUESTION: So you mean you think you have to see . . .

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Something has to happen.

QUESTION: . . . any sort of concrete steps?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Something has to happen on the ground.

QUESTION: In this round?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I mean something's not going to happen next weekend. I mean, we're just having a meeting. But as a result of next weekend, something has to happen within a reasonable amount of time. And what's a reasonable amount of time? You'll hear after Beijing. That's something you can measure in, you know, weeks.

QUESTION: Will that be . . . ?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Something. Something. But I'm reluctant to tell you what the something is.

QUESTION: You mean weeks, not months.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Yes, weeks. Weeks. Single-digit weeks. Does that help?

QUESTION: That's very helpful.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: You know, you can probably guess what some of these things are going to be, but what I simply want to emphasize again and again is these are just an initial set of actions, an initial tranche, an early harvest. They are not the whole process. And people will look at this and start comparing it to previous efforts and will want to judge it. Depending on their perspective, they'll call that failure or success. And you cannot call it a failure or success, because it's just an initial step.

I'm just saying what will be more important is whether these few actions that we will identify in Beijing and we will announce in Beijing, the real question is will they get implemented within single-digit weeks and what comes next. Will this be part of an overall process leading to the fulfillment of the September statement? So we're going to try to do that.

QUESTION: Suppose North Korea did something which you are expecting within the single-digit weeks. Then are you willing to provide for heavy oil or some kind of . . .

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Again, I don't want to get into specific elements. I understand why you're asking. I've seen some speculation in the media. Somebody was in Pyongyang over the weekend from America (inaudible). But after we meet in Beijing and after we figure out what we're all going to try to do, we'll announce it and then we'll explain it. (Inaudible).

QUESTION: Going back to that "something" again, are you meaning to say that . . .

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: When I'm done with this job, by the way, you will never see me anywhere near this. The only place you'll see me is in Fenway Park in Boston watching Matsuzaka pitch. That will be the only public place I'm ever at again.

All right. Go ahead.

QUESTION: Are you meaning to say that "something" has to happen on both sides or on all?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: What do you mean both sides?

QUESTION: I mean not only on the side of North Korea but also on the side of the United States.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: It's a negotiation. It's a negotiation. So any negotiation I've ever been in involves more than one party. So there will have to be some actions that we all will sit down and work on. And we know the situation the Japanese Government is in. They have a serious issue here, this abduction question that people in Japan need answers to. They need to understand where that's going. So we understand that's there. So through this negotiated process we'll see what we come out with. I go into this -- Certainly I've got a compass that kind of keeps me in the direction I want to go in, but I can't tell you precisely how we'll get there. I have a certain way to approach it, but I don't know precisely how it's going to turn out. That's why we're having the meeting.

QUESTION: It's safe to say that something has to be implemented reciprocally, not only on one side?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think we need to look at, yes, I think there would have to be some sort of actions and agreement for additional actions -- because, again, we are not interested in just one tranche. One tranche would be a failure. We're interested in moving beyond that. But to get to the final destination, we have to go through the initial actions.

QUESTION: My name is Takeuchi from Nikkei Newspaper. Do you have an idea to go to the DPRK depending on the result of the next round?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: You know, I will go wherever my government thinks I should go, whatever is helpful. I don't think we have an immediate plan to do that. I think we're beyond the issue of whether we meet, whether we don't meet. I think we're prepared to -- We have a mechanism, a multilateral mechanism within that. We have a lot of visits. We have a lot of bilateral meetings. I don't think we have any limitations on how we do things now. I think what we have to do is determine whether it's in our interests. So I don't have any immediate plans to go anywhere beyond going to Beijing and then finally getting home. But if I go to Pyongyang, I'll take you with me if you like. Air Koryo is supposed to be pretty good -- good lunch in-flight, apparently.

QUESTION: My name is Furuta from Tokyo Shimbun. Do you think you will take a long time within the next session? I wouldn't say bilateral, but U.S. and North Korea sitting at the same table?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think the Chinese have in mind about three days. I've heard three or four days -- that's what they're telling people. The way it works is we have these plenary sessions where we have the full delegations meeting. It's an enormous hall. Each delegation has 20 or 30 people times six. You go around this enormous table with this flower arrangement in the middle. You speak in sentences and then it's consecutively translated into four other languages. You know that the interpreters are finished because when you complete your sentence, you have five lights go off -- sort of plastic tulips. And then you watch as each plastic tulip goes off, meaning that each interpreter has completed translating you into Russian, Korean, Chinese, Japanese. It's not a terribly good way to do business. It's not even a good way to give a speech.

So after that affair, which really looks like something you would see in a movie or something rather than in reality, you have a somewhat more useful process of a head of delegation meeting, where you have the head of delegation and maybe plus two. That's a much smaller table. That's a little better. And then you have a lot of bilateral meetings, because there are a lot of different rooms. So I would expect what we've usually done is we meet with all the delegations everyday. Probably most meetings are between us and Sasae and/or the South Koreans, because we're coordinating our policies as much as we can, because we frankly have the closest views on things. I also meet the Chinese, because they're the hosts, and I like to know if they're going to circulate a draft or something. So by the time you deal with this kind of combination of a plenary session, a head of the delegation meeting, the various bilateral meetings, I think three or four days sounds about right. We'll see.

QUESTION: Are you going to make some papers in this round?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I assume there will be some outcome, yes.

QUESTION: Like a chairman's statement?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Something like that, yes. I think there will have to be an outcome, because what we're looking for, as I said, is the first tranche of actions. And since you don't want people to have different interpretations of the actions, you probably need to write that down. So whether it's a chairman's statement or actually an agreed minute from the six parties, we'll have to see what the Chinese have in mind. But I think everybody has a sense that we have to get something going on the ground and not just with more declarations and whatnot. I mean, the Chinese argued in December that it was useful that everyone reaffirmed the September statement. Okay, but I think we need to do more than that.

QUESTION: So you think it should not be like a second joint statement?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don't know. We will see. I think the point is it has to be something that everyone is obliged to follow. I think that would be useful. I doubt it'll be signed, because we didn't sign the joint statement. But I think it has to be something that's mutually agreeable to all the delegations, I think. Again, we have to find out. I'll get there tomorrow afternoon and see what the Chinese -- they always have more patience than the rest of us. It comes from a 4,000-year-old civilization. You know, we're only 230 years old or whatever we are.

QUESTION: I'd like to ask about your midterm expectation.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: What expectation?

QUESTION: Midterm expectation.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Midterm?

QUESTION: Yes. I mean that could you tell us how do you envisage you holding these Six-Party Talks in these upcoming two years? Something like that.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, in the coming couple of years, probably there will be more working groups, meaning that there will be -- I mean if we're successful, there will be some working groups. And they would meet between Six-Party rounds as well. So we would hope that we can be making progress not just every time the six parties meet but also between the times the six parties are meeting through working groups. Probably these working groups could be chaired by different countries, depending on what the working group is. I say "probably," because I don't know right now, and please write that. But I think the actual Six-Party process, we would expect the Chinese to remain in the chair, exactly where we would like them. I think sometimes the Chinese have in their generosity wanted to relinquish the chair. But we've asked them not to be so generous, that they should keep it themselves.

QUESTION: You reportedly said that the leadership of North Korea seems to be divided over whether or not to go ahead or to move forward on the Six-Party Yalks.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don't think I said that, but go ahead. It may be true. It's just that I don't remember actually saying that.

QUESTION: How did you get that sense, and how worried are you about that?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think what you're referring to is I may have said that the leadership may not know -- the leadership in the DPRK may not know whether it wants to go ahead or not. Certainly, holding up the Six-Party Talks for a year and half over a banking issue in Macau would lead one to believe that maybe they're not so sure of going ahead. After all, the banking issue in Macau is a small amount of money; we're talking $24 million, I think. So would you hold up a process that involves much more money than that in terms of potential trade and investment and things like that, would you hold it all up for 18 months over a sum of $24 million? So you have to ask yourself the question, why would they do that unless they were maybe not sure that they wanted to implement the September statement? So I think it's a good sign that they want to come back now. Certainly my bilateral consultations with them in Berlin give me some reason to believe that they want to come back and try to make some progress. But I want to emphasize to you that we have to wait and see how the game plays out in Beijing.

QUESTION: My name is Ito from the Yomiuri Shimbun. I'd like to ask about some kind of timetable implementation of denuclearization of DPRK. Do you have any timetable or roadmap or [inaudible], and do you plan to put them on the table in this session or in the session in the future?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think it's important that we get some overall timeframe for implementation of the September statement. And I'd like to get an overall timeframe. I pressed for that in December, and I'll press for it again. But I'm not sure the DPRK is ready to commit to a specific timetable. So we may have to be satisfied for the time being with timetables for these tranches. But I think we do need an overall timeframe, because I think people want to make sure that the September statement is going to be fully implemented. And what better way to make it implemented than to set a timetable for its implementation? But I've pressed for it in the past and did not achieve success on that, so I'll try again in the future.

All right. See you there!