April 9, 2003	Wednesday	Safar 6, 1424

UNITED NATIONS, April 8: The UN Security Council will discuss the North Korea nuclear crisis for the first time on Wednesday, but is already torn by debate on whether the meeting should even be taking place.

North Korea has warned that any sanctions will be taken as “a declaration of war.” But the closed-door session is unlikely to lead to concrete punitive measures against the Stalinist state, diplomats said.

That will leave the North sticking to its demand for direct talks with the United States, which in turn is trying to force other nations take a greater role in disarming the prickly government in Pyongyang.

The United States has been locked in a crisis with North Korea since October when it accused Pyongyang of violating a 1994 accord to halt its nuclear programmes.

But China and Russia fear that bringing North Korea before the Security Council will push the crisis-stricken state back into isolation.

Their reluctance to discuss the crisis in the council recalls the fierce diplomatic battle which split the world’s top security body in the run-up to the Iraq war.

Any eventual decision on sanctions would also force both states with a tricky decision on whether to back punishment for Pyongyang, a nominal ally.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said it was “not appropriate” for the Security Council to discuss the issue now.

“Relevant parties should not take any actions that will lead to the escalation of the situation,” Liu said in a statement from Beijing.

In Moscow, Alexander Losyukov, the foreign ministry’s curator of Asian affairs, warned that the planned Security Council meeting would worsen the “very dangerous” crisis.

“We need to take urgent measures to cool off the situation,” Losyukov was quoted by ITAR-TASS, while calling for direct US-North Korean talks to settle the issue.

“Otherwise, the UN Security Council discussion could, instead, become a launching pad for a further unraveling of relations,” he added.

Since October, North Korea has expelled UN nuclear inspectors, restarted its mothballed nuclear reactor at Yongbyon that can produce weapons grade plutonium, withdrawn from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and test-launched a missile.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN nuclear watchdog, decided in February to refer North Korea’s case to the Security Council, because of its repeat bad behaviour.

Only the Security Council can order sanctions against a member country but not even a draft resolution has been considered yet.

“We are not yet at this stage,” a high-ranking diplomat at the United Nations said.

US ambassador John Negroponte said last week that Wednesday’s meeting would be “simply a discussion”.

State Department deputy spokesman Philip Reeker said on Monday however that it was still the responsibility of the United Nations to discuss such a grave matter that affects international security.

North Korea is still angrily denouncing the United States even though it wants direct talks.

Pyongyang says that Washington is to blame for the collapse of the 1994 accord, by not providing the replacement light water nuclear reactors to produce the power it desperately needs.

The North said on Sunday it considered the council meeting as a “prelude to war” and that it would not recognize any resolution emerging from the Security Council. Earlier it said a resolution would be considered as a “declaration of war”.

The North Korea said the Iraq war showed that the United States, which keeps 37,000 troops in South Korea, has no commitment to peaceful disarmament.

The Security Council meeting will come on the eve of a new symbolic date. On Thursday, diplomats said, North Korea will be officially free of its commitments under the Non-Proliferation Treaty from which it withdrew on Feb 10.—AFP