China still demonstrating 'ambiguous' stance on North Korea
Updated
The United Nations' latest resolution on North Korea, which includes fresh sanctions over the country's atomic test last month, significantly received the support of Russia and China, but some say this does not signal a complete change in Beijing's ties with Pyongyang. One prominent North Korea watcher, Dr Leonid Petrov, says China's position is ambiguous, and that none of the UN Security Council members are willing to change the status quo too drastically.
Presenter: Zulfikar Abbany
Speaker: Dr Leonid Petrov, Centre for Korean Studies, Australian National University
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PETROV: China's demonstrating a sort of ambiguity in the relations toward North Korea. First, China does not need and does not want to have a new nuclear state on its borders, but China doesn't equally like any possibility or prospect of Korea's unification, violent or peaceful, where American troops which are now stationed in South Korea might advance and come closer to the Chinese borders. So the rationale which Beijing is pursuing is simply to prop up the regime and not to push it too hard, avoiding the situation where the regime might collapse.
ABBANY: So, we might still see another turnaround from China, that it sort of backs away from this resolution?
PETROV: Yeah, China was not really very keen on delivering radical measures which might badly affect Pyongyang's ability to survive because whatever happens on the Korean peninsula there are too many players looking very keenly and very nervously on potential developments. So, China is, as well as Russia, as well as South Korea and Japan, very concerned and very nervous about the outcome of the current situation because for many decades they have been playing a zero-sum game, where whichever advantaged one side was achieving the other counterpart was actually losing. So, they don't want it to happen again and they simply try to maintain the status quo, and the best status quo for each of the five parties, you know, of the six-party talks, would be to just keep North Korea alive, keep North Korea weak.
ABBANY: In a sense to keep the whole thing bubbling over?
PETROV: Yeah, well North Korea, the sudden collapse of the regime is not in anyone's interest, you know, the refugees might start going in all directions, also the advantage of one side over the other may spoil the national interests of the other side. So, maintaining and propping up the regime, but keeping it weak and rather harmless is the aim and goal of each of the member of the UN Security Council as well as six-party talks members.
ABBANY: But North Korea has come out saying it's going to weaponise its plutonium, which I suppose means it's going to attach missile warheads to its plutonium, it's also going to restart enriching uranium, it's said that this could start a nuclear war on the Korean peninsula, which obviously puts the locals at risk. Is North Korea on a self-destructive path now? I mean, we talk about its provoking the international community. Does it really want the international community to launch an attack against it?
PETROV: Altogether even if North Koreans are processing all available plutonium, they probably won't have half a dozen nuclear devices, they're rather big and bulky, they don't have enough carriers to put these payloads and then deliver them elsewhere. So, it's more and more of the rhetoric. But what we can see clearly from the recent signals coming from Pyongyang is that the domestic situation is not very easy and what is happening in Pyongyang is basically the slow creeping change of the regime. The change of regime, not in the line which probably Seoul, Tokyo, Washington would like to see, but kind of negative, a regression, it's a negative development which actually demonstrates the wish of the current North Korean leaders, the conservative hawkish generals to turn the clock back and to push everything where it was in the 1960s, 70s and 80s. It is a difficult task to achieve, particularly given the last ten years of inter-Korean cooperation, the last ten years of reconciliation and peace process, which was happening between North and South Korea. But North Korea is definitely trying to isolate itself because only in isolation, this regime can survive. But this security council actually what it's doing is helping North Korea to survive by imposing an even harsher iron curtain around the country, if the vessels are going to be searched, and people are going to be refused visas. So, we're going to face a situation where North Korea is going to be isolated and this is definitely going to benefit the current conservative government in Pyongyang.
