Kim, Hu discuss widening economic cooperation

 

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il held summit talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao in Beijing on Wednesday apparently on boosting economic cooperation and resolving deadlock over Pyongyang's nuclear programs.

As Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao told South Korean President Lee Myung-bak Sunday that Kim's trip, the third in just more than one year, is aimed at learning from China's market-oriented reforms, expansion of bilateral economic relationship and provision of additional economic aid to the poverty-stricken North appeared to be the dominant agenda at the summit held at the Great Hall of the People.

 

Kim's arrival in Beijing earlier Wednesday came after the reclusive leader toured various industrial facilities, including an auto plant, an electronics producer, a discount store and an IT company in northeastern and central eastern Chinese cities, such as Changchun, Yangzhou and Nanjing, over the past six days.

Details of the summit, let alone Kim's itinerary, have not been available as North Korea and China remain almost silent on his trip shrouded, as is typical, in secrecy.

Sources say that Kim and Hu held in-depth discussions on expanding the North-bound food aid, revitalizing economic cooperation and increasing Chinese firms' investment in the North, among others.

They note that a large number of Chinese leaders and ranking officials also attended a welcome dinner for Kim held after the summit talks. Indeed, Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo and Wang Jiarui, head of the International Department of the Central Committee of China's Communist Party, are known to have closely accompanied Kim on his Chinese trip that began last Friday, displaying deepening friendship between the two allies.

Kim's motorcade entered the Great Hall of the People at 5:30 p.m. (local time) and left at 8:45 p.m. for the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, meaning the two leaders spent over three hours together at summit talks and dinner.

Earlier on Wednesday, the 69-year-old Kim arrived at the Beijing guest house after wrapping up a 19-hour ride through China's eastern areas from Nanjing aboard his special train.
In accordance with a long-standing custom, Kim is believed to have already held talks with Premier Wen shortly after his arrival at the Diaoyutai. The North Korean leader is expected to leave for Pyongyang Thursday.

he North has vowed to become a prosperous country by 2012, but it is still struggling to feed its people amid a nuclear standoff with the United States, South Korea and other regional powers.

The nuclear row keeps the United States from normalizing ties with the North, which is under U.N. sanctions over its nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009. That hindered Pyongyang's efforts to attract outside investment, a key to improving the economy.

Against the backdrop, the North is seeking to boost economic cooperation with China, the North's last remaining ally and benefactor.

Among a number of projects under discussion, the two neighbors plan to turn an island in the Yalu River on their border into an industrial complex.

Still, Kim was expected to touch on the sensitive issue of his hereditary power succession plan to try to win endorsement from China, said the sources.

Kim, who inherited power from his late father and North Korean founder Kim Il-sung, has taken steps to extend his family dynasty into a third generation since he suffered a stroke in 2008.

He named his youngest son, Jong-un, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the North's ruling Workers' Party and a four-star general last year in the clearest sign yet to make him the next North Korean leader.

The summit came five days after Kim crossed the border and toured major cities in China's northeastern and southeastern areas on what appears to be a study tour of China's vibrant economy.

Hu indirectly urged Kim to open his isolated country during their previous summit held in the northeastern city of Changchun last August.

Kim has so far visited an automaker, IT companies, a solar energy company and a large discount store as well as a top electronics company as he traveled about 5,000 kilometers across China's northeastern and southeastern regions before reaching Beijing.

China has repeatedly pressed its impoverished ally to follow in its footsteps in embracing the reform that lifted millions of Chinese out of poverty and helped Beijing's rise to the world's second-largest economy.

North Korea appears to be concerned that outside influences associated with reform and openness could undermine its control on its 24 million people and eventually pose a threat to its regime's survival.

North Korea's dependence on China for diplomatic and economic aid has been on the rise amid its isolation from the international community over its nuclear ambitions. The North conducted nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009, drawing international condemnation and U.N. sanctions.

On Tuesday, the United States said it imposed sanctions on a North Korean firm and 15 other foreign firms for trading equipment and technology for the production of weapons of mass destruction.

The trade volume between North Korea and China stood at US$3.46 billion in 2010, up from $2.68 billion in 2009, according to South Korea's Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs.

Kim's ongoing trip is likely to serve as a litmus test on whether it is serious about reform and openness.

The North's experiment with limited reforms backfired in recent years, deepening the country's economic woes with no relief in sight anytime soon.

In March, the U.N. food agency appealed for 430,000 tons of food aid to feed 6 million vulnerable North Korean people, a quarter of the country's population.

Robert King, the U.S. envoy for North Korean human rights, is visiting North Korea to assess the North's food situation, a possible indication of the resumption of food aid to the North.

The summit also comes amid no signs of progress to resume long-stalled talks aimed at ending Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programs. The talks involve the two Koreas, the United States, host China, Russia and Japan.

The North has expressed its willingness to rejoin the nuclear talks that it quit in 2009, but Seoul and Washington demand that Pyongyang first demonstrate its denuclearization commitment by action.

Seoul also wants Pyongyang to apologize for its two deadly attacks on the South last year. 

 

 

Source: The Korea Herald