It is possible that South Korea feared the sudden death of Kim Il
Sung would lead to a political and economic collapse in the North and
a human tidal wave of refugees moving south. In any case, the South's
actual reaction to Kim's death was a disaster insofar as building
mutual trust was concerned and revealed a deep-seated lack of
confidence in itself. In retaliation, North Korea hardened its
position on relations with South Korea.

On August 5, 1994, talks between North Korea and the United States
resumed in Geneva. They led to a so-called "Agreed Framework" that
the two sides signed on October 21, 1994. According to this framework
the United States agrees to arrange for the construction by the year
2003 of two 1,000 megawatt light-water reactors in North Korea to
replace its current graphite-moderated reactors (a Soviet design from
which plutonium can more easily be extracted). It also agrees to
provide fuel oil to replace the energy lost by the closing of North
Korea's current reactors, and assures Pyongyang that it will not use
or threaten to use nuclear weapons in Korea. For its part North Korea
agrees to freeze and then dismantle its current reactors, ship its
used nuclear fuel rods out of the country, remain a party to the NPT,
and allow IAEA inspection of its nuclear sites. The agreement has a
self-enforcing quality in that either side can drop out at any time
if the other does not appear to be living up to the agreement.

The truly astonishing thing about this agreement is that the United
States negotiated a deal, in the words of Oh and Hassig, "whose
central incentives--LWRs [light-water reactors] and oil
deliveries--are to be paid for by other nations." The total cost of
the reactors is estimated in the range of $4- to $4.5 billion. Japan
at first balked, and opposition political strongman Ozawa Ichiro said
that disposal of any possible North Korean nuclear weapons should be
a precondition for financial assistance, especially since the
inspections the North agreed to will not actually occur for more than
five years. But by March of this year Japan and South Korea had
agreed to pay for the reactors; and all three countries--the United
States, the Republic of Korea, and Japan--had set up a new
organization called the Korean Energy Development Organization (KEDO)
to do the actual construction work. Ja

Essay Types: Essay