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John Kerry appeals to China over North Korea nuclear talks

: Feb 20, 2014 - : 11:51 pm

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U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday, February 14, he had won a commitment from China to help bring a belligerent North Korea back to nuclear disarmament talks, even as he butted heads with Chinese leaders over a series of increasingly aggressive steps Beijing has taken to assert itself in territorial disputes with its smaller neighbors.

Kerry met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other senior officials as he sought to underscore the Obama administration’s commitment to refocusing U.S. foreign policy on the Asia-Pacific amid myriad other global priorities. He addressed issues ranging from climate change, human rights and rule of law, to Syria and Iran with his Chinese hosts.

Speaking to reporters following those talks, Kerry praised China for joining with the U.S. in calling for North Korea to dismantle its nuclear programs and said he urged Beijing to “use every tool at its disposal” to convince its communist neighbor to return to the long-stalled disarmament talks.

North Korea “must take meaningful, concrete and irreversible steps toward verifiable denuclearization and it needs to begin now,” Kerry said. “China could not have more forcefully reiterated its commitment to that goal, its interest in achieving that goal and its concerns about not achieving that goal.”

Kerry said the Chinese officials had told him they were willing to take additional steps to achieve North Korean denuclearization and that both sides had traded ideas for further consideration. He did not elaborate on what those steps were, but a day earlier in South Korea had suggested they could involve reductions in commercial and energy trade between China and North Korea.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, meanwhile, said China would never allow chaos or war on the Korean Peninsula.

“China is serious on this, as shown not only in our words but in our actions,” Wang said, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

While China is North Korea’s only significant ally and main source of economic assistance, the extent of China’s influence, and willingness to use it, is unclear following a purge in the isolated country’s leadership.

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