Press Availability at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade

As you know, the Japanese have some special interests on the very difficult matter of the abductions. It’s my view, though, that the progress we make on denuclearization will help make a stronger platform, a stronger foundation for dealing with some of the other tough issues, including the abduction question. So, I’m going to be talking to my Japanese counterparts about that.

Here in Korea, we have continued our very close cooperation on the issues of how to move forward, what the timing of the next Six-Party meeting should be, what the timing of the ministerial should be. Again, we’re going to have to pick up the pace on our timelines and get through this very crucial phase of disablement.

QUESTION: Is the IAEA entering Korea on Monday or Tuesday?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I do not know whether it’s Monday or Tuesday. I think their press release said the week beginning on Monday. You will have to ask them what flight they're taking.

QUESTION: Is the US setting any sort of deadline for the reactor closure, and would there be any penalties if North Korea doesn’t comply?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I do not like to talk about deadlines and penalties and things like that. Right now, we have a process that is moving forward. We have not been moving forward for many weeks, so we are pleased that our process is moving forward. And what we want to do is continue to build momentum so that, not only can we get through these initial actions, but we can then move to the next phase -- which will involve the considerable amounts of fuel oil. And that is something we have been talking about with our ROK colleagues. So, there is a lot of work ahead of us.

QUESTION: Do you expect the disablement to come in a matter of weeks, as you said before?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think disablement would be the next phase. We need to get this first phase, which involves shutting down the reactor for its eventual abandonment. And then the plan is to have our ministers get together -- all six ministers -- to discuss how we might proceed with the next phase, which has some key elements in it -- including disablement. But also on the North Korean side, for their benefit, there’s considerable amounts of heavy fuel oil. And it's heavy fuel oil that will be shared right now among four countries -- the U.S. and ROK and Russia and China. And as Japanese bilateral issues, especially the abduction issues, begin to be resolved or begin to be addressed, we look forward to seeing Japan join in that as well.

QUESTION: (Inaudible) The countries want to pick up the pace, but North Korea seems to be taking all the time it needs. Do you have any measures to speed up the process?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I think we are going to have to think about what we can do to pick up the pace. I’ve always felt that although the timelines were very tight in the first phase, in the second phase of disablement I think there is room to get back on to the schedule -- so that by the end of this calendar year we can see a considerably improved position. So I think the next days and weeks will be critical in our effort to achieve our timelines.

QUESTION: Do you have any idea of when Japan and North Korea should reconvene the working groups?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Again, we felt that the working groups that we held in March did not achieve all the objectives that we set out for them. And, in particular, we felt more work needed to be done on denuclearization. But also the Energy Working Group, we felt, needed a lot more technical discussion. For example, the agreement is for an additional 950,000 tons of fuel oil, and it is not clear what the storage capacity of the North Koreans is for the fuel oil. So is it going to be fuel oil at a certain rate per month, or is it going to be fuel oil that they will have the right to gain access to at a rate to be determined? Hard to tell. So the nuclear working group needs to be worked on, the energy working group, and I would say, based on the reports that I got from Hanoi, obviously we would like to see more progress on the Japan-North Korean working group.

I said to my DPRK counterpart on many occasions that a good relationship with Japan is very much in their interest, and I think they need to understand the deep concerns that there are in Japan about some of these issues --especially the issue of abductions. And so I hope that some progress can be made on that. We will continue to be in very close contact with the Japanese Government on this working group.

QUESTION: Do you think that they should reconvene the discussion as soon as possible?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I’m always for reconvening things as soon as possible. But let me just say that I think they need to work on getting a resumption -- but make sure that it is planned in a way that, not only do they resume it as soon as possible, but they resume it in a way that progress can be made.

QUESTION: Shutdown can be appropriate conditions for your visit to North Korea. I just want to know the timing, what you think about your visit DPRK.

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I’ve just made some consultations in Beijing, I’m here in Seoul, tonight. I’ll be in Tokyo. I’ve been in contact with the IAEA. I think we need to try to make sure that we make progress as soon as possible. So I’m not really discussing further travel at this time.

QUESTION: What did you discuss with the IAEA? Did you discuss the procedures for the shutdown or even --

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: Well, we’ve had those discussions earlier. Basically, I was curious about the timing. As you know, they’ve had an exchange of letters. I want to make sure that everyone understood the need to move quickly. I think the IAEA has understood that need, and a number of us would have liked to see things happen this week. But they are going to happen on Monday instead, or the week starting on Monday. I think we have a good deal of respect for the IAEA personnel involved with this, and I’m sure they are trying to work as hard as they can.

QUESTION: Regarding the banking issue, have you heard anything new from (inaudible)?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: I was hoping no one would ask me about banking again. But as long you’ve asked me, I understand that everything was clear as of last night. And there are a number of time zones to be concerned about, because the Far East Bank is in Vladivostok and the Central Bank is in Moscow. But if it has not been transferred by now, I’m sure it will be very, very soon. We really are done with that issue. So no more banking questions, please.

QUESTION: In the morning, you met Minister Song. What did you discuss about?

ASSISTANT SECRETARY HILL: We discussed a broad number of subjects, including our bilateral relationship. We discussed issues of U.S.-Korean cooperation in the third country situations, such as in Iraq and elsewhere. And we discussed, of course, the DPRK denuclearization issue.

See you all later. I've got to get moving and then get on to Tokyo.