Comments to Reporters Upon Arrival in Japan

Comments to Reporters Upon Arrival in Japan

Christopher R. Hill, Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Narita Airport Tokyo, Japan July 13, 2007

QUESTION: Can I ask you a question?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Sure.

QUESTION: You mentioned four-party talks for peace on the Korean Peninsula the other day. Are you going to talk about it in this meeting?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, look. First of all, there are a number of things we have to do now to follow up on these first actions from February. One of the issues, of course, is to get going with the next phase, which involves the complete declaration and the disablement of the facility. And then we& rsquo;ll talk about some of the issues.

There's another idea of having a ministerial, which we would like to do. But again, we have to plan that carefully and figure out the purpose of it and the timing of it. First, they were talking the end of July, which is difficult. So we'll try to get it done sometime in August, but certainly before APEC. And another issue, of course, is this idea of a Northeast Asian – some sort of forum or mechanism.

And still another idea is, of course, the idea of peace talks on the Korean Peninsula among sort of directly concerned parties. So the text, I think, reads "directly related parties" or something. I think a lot of people are assuming that means four -- that is the two Koreas and China and the U.S., which were all involved in the Korean War. So that has to be looked at, and we'll see about the timing.

But I think what is clear is we won't have any kind of these instruments until complete denuclearization. Now we don't want to wait for complete denuclearization in order to start that process. So we will probably start it -- you know, assuming we're making progress on denuclearization -- we'd like to start it by the end of this year. But it won't be finished until we have denuclearization. So we've got a long way to go.

QUESTION: The four-party talks will be held at the same time as the Six-Party Talks?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I think it would be -- Again, we have to have a discussion about that. I assume that if we're talking about by the end of & rsquo;07 among the directly related parties, there would be some sort of process. We could get the process going while the Six-Party discussions are still going on. But I want to emphasize that we’re not going to be reaching any peace agreement on the Peninsula ahead of denuclearization. But at the same time, we don't want to wait for complete denuclearization in order to start it. So yes, there will be an overlap in terms of time, but we have a lot of work to do. We lost a lot of time this spring, and the second half of 2007 already makes me very jetlagged just to think about it.

QUESTION: Mr. Hill, what do you think about North Korea proposed military talks between North Korea and the U.S.? Is U.S. prepared to take up this proposal and meet them anytime, anywhere?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I need to see what is, and obviously talk to people. I've been on the plane, so I haven't seen the proposal. I was just watching some movies.

QUESTION: But this proposal comes up next week at the round of talks. Would you -- .

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Let me get a look at it and see what it is, and let me talk to some people, and I'm sure we'll have a considered and careful answer to it. Obviously, we are interested in resolving not only energy issues on the Korean Peninsula, not only nuclear issues, but broader issues, as well as peace and security issues. But we need to have a look at it. And I'm sorry, I've been on the plane for the last 13 hours.

QUESTION: The KCNA message also included the armistice clause, referred to it, and to see if a U.S. military pullout from the Korean Peninsula is a possibility. I’m sorry; you’ll have a look at it.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I’m sorry; I haven’t seen it.

QUESTION: The upcoming round of six-way talks – would you be willing to make it a negotiating round, a negotiation round rather than –

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: What, this round?

QUESTION: -- rather than combination of where we are and where we are headed?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: You mean the round coming up in Beijing next week?

QUESTION: Yes.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think what we want to do -- Obviously, we want to talk to the Chinese, who are the hosts and will be setting the agenda. So we'll be doing some consulting with the Chinese, as everyone will do, on Tuesday in advance of the meeting on Wednesday. But I think that the plan is to try to look at all the work we have ahead of us and try to come up with some kind of work plan to try to complete all that work. So I don't look for this session of head of delegation to be reaching some kind of agreement like the February agreement or the September agreement. I think it will be more an effort to organize the considerable work that we have in the months ahead.

QUESTION: Mr. Hill, I want to ask you again about the military talks.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Again, I’m sorry. I don't know anything about it. I'm learning about it for the first time, and I appreciate your keeping me informed. (Laughter.) I really have to study it.

QUESTION: Is that going to make it difficult for the talks in Beijing next week?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Again, the talks in Beijing, I think, are to look ahead to see what we need to get accomplished. I'm sure we'll look carefully at what the DPRK military has said. But this is the first I've heard of it.

QUESTION: What’s going on on Saturday?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Saturday, well. I guess we're going to have some bad weather here. But that's okay. I brought a hat. So I think I will get a chance to see a little of Japan -- not just the hotel, the very nice hotel I stay at in Tokyo -- and maybe get a little out of Tokyo. But then I have to get moving Sunday night.

QUESTION: Which hotel are you going to stay in this weekend?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don’t want to tell you which hotel I’m going to stay in. (Laughter.) If there's any news over the weekend -- namely tomorrow, because I think Sunday I'll already be back to Haneda Airport heading to Seoul -- but if there's any news tomorrow, I think through the American Embassy we'll arrange some press availability. I think it'll be down not far from Tokyo, but out of Tokyo.

QUESTION: The hotel is the oldest one? The oldest one?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don’t know. I don't know. I'm just looking forward to an opportunity to see a little of Japan. Every time I come to Japan, I go to meetings, I go to dinner, and then I go into a hotel room. And then I get up and I have more meetings and more meals. So this time I hope to get out of Tokyo and see a little of this beautiful country.

Okay?

QUESTION: What are you going to discuss with Mr. Sasae?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, again, I think we're going to do a lot of consulting about how we should coordinate our positions next week. As you know, we talk a lot together. In fact, I was just on the phone with him last night just before coming here. So we'll just continue these consultations. We like to be coordinated, because when we sit down in the Six-Parties, we like to know each other's position.

QUESTION: Do you expect that the talks in Beijing are going to be smooth, or --

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I think it'll be fairly smooth. And fortunately, we won't be talking about BDA. That's always good news. And we won't be talking about shutting down the reactor in the Yongbyon facility, because we expect that to be done ahead of time. So I think we can talk about the coming months and how to organize a work plan, and I hope we can achieve consensus on that. But I don't think we're looking for some agreed document with negotiating 23 hours a day, that sort of thing. So I think it should be okay.

QUESTION: Do have any particular timeline in mind for full declaration?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, I have something in my mind, but let me see how I do with the others. But we'd like to get full declaration in a few months and then the disabling of the reactor by the end of the year so that we can go on to endgame items in ’08 -- that is, the abandonment of the fissile material and explosive devices. And we will have some requirements on our side.

So there's a lot to get organized. We need to get these working groups going, especially in denuclearization, because there will be questions of how you disable a reactor. There are a lot of ways to do it. There'll be questions of -- You'll recall there's a fuel oil consideration of 950,000 tons. So there's a real question of how you can get all that fuel oil into the DPRK in a reasonable amount of time, because we're talking about equivalents of fuel oil. So we need experts to get together in the energy working groups. It's really a lot of work.

QUESTION: Do you expect North Korea to say in public what they told you during last time you were in Pyongyang?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I’m sorry. Do I expect what?

QUESTION: North Koreans to say in public from their mouth –

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I don’t have -- There were no secret agreements reached in Pyongyang. We used it as part of a consultation. We have been in Seoul, in Tokyo, and Beijing, and we went to Pyongyang and tried to take it and make it part of the round of consultations. So we didn't reach any agreement there. But we had a good discussion about the need to keep the momentum going. We lost a lot of momentum for four months or whatever waiting for this banking issue. So momentum -- it's important. It's important in baseball. It's important in Six-Party Talks.

Speaking of which, I probably ought to get in a car and get some momentum for my meetings. We'll see you all later.

ENDS

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