By Lee Chi-dong
The Banco Delta Asia (BDA) bank is arguably one of the biggest roadblocks to international efforts to resolve the North Korean nuclear crisis through six-way talks on the matter. In September last year, Washington blacklisted the bank, prompting Pyongyang to boycott the nuclear talks.
Confusion began with remarks by South Korean Vice Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan.
"It may take some time, but the BDA issue is expected to be concluded soon," he told a parliamentary inspection hearing on Wednesday.
"In my understanding, once the six-way talks are resumed, the U.S. Treasury will reach a conclusion, based on its investigation so far, on whether to define the BDA as a money-laundering bank," he added.
In the end, the Chinese government will be responsible for the issue of unfreezing the North Korean accounts in the BDA, he added.
The remarks were the most clear and concrete assessment yet by a South Korean government official on the BDA-related situation, which has remained a mystery due to the sensitivity of the issue.
But Yu’s comments were disputed by a senior South Korean Foreign Ministry official, who cautioned against expecting an immediate solution to the thorny problem.
"I think Vice Foreign Minister Yu presented such an upbeat expectation based on his thoughts," the official said, asking not to be identified.
He stressed that it is hard to draw a line between licit and illicit assets of the reclusive communist regime.
"As far as I know, the U.S. position remains firm that it will discuss the issue within the six-way talks, depending on the attitude of North Koreans," he added.
He stressed that the verb "discuss" has big differences with the word "negotiate" in diplomacy.
He pointed out that North Korea and the U.S. seem to be taking a slightly different approach towards their agreement during an informal meeting between their top nuclear envoys in Beijing on Tuesday, brokered by China.
North Korea said that its decision to rejoin the six-party talks are attributable to the U.S. pledge to "discuss and settle" the financial disputes.
The announcement triggered media speculation that North Korea and the U.S. might have reached a significant deal on the issue.
A South Korean newspaper, the JoongAng Ilbo, also quoted a U.S. expert on North Korea as saying in its Thursday edition that Washington may unfreeze one third of US$24 million of North Korean accounts held in the BDA before the next round of the six-way talks open sometime later this year. Don Oberdorfer, a professor at Johns Hopkins University, was cited as saying that the U.S. views at least US$8 million among the assets as licit.
The U.S. has given no indication that it will take immediate action on the BDA issue. The U.S. Treasury refused Yonhap News Agency’s request for comments, citing a policy not to talk publicly about North Korea-related problem.
Christopher Hill, the U.S. lead delegate to the talks, said after the Beijing meeting, that there was no specific "condition" for the North to come back to the table.
As for the financial issue, he said "We agreed that we could ... that we will find a mechanism within the six-party process to address these financial measures, that we could ... it would probably be some kind of a working group to deal with this." Speaking to a press briefing on Wednesday (Washington time), a U.S. State Department spokesman also reiterated that the BDA problem is a matter for law enforcement.
(Yonhap, November 2, 2006)
