Managing Negotiations for Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula

This article discusses the negotiations for denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, including the interests of the US and DPRK, their power positions, past negotiations, available negotiation options, and recommendations for improving the negotiations. A possible course of action to end nuclear production is also suggested.

Running head: MANAGING NEGOTIATIONS 1
Name of the Members
Course
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Managing Negotiations
Date

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What the Parties Are Negotiating For and Their Interests
Since the DPRK’s became a ballistic missile threat, it has called for the United States and
the superpower nations to intervene. These parties are trying to forge a negotiated talk to ensure
that denuclearized peninsula is restored. In the past, the United Nations was forced to cut its
diplomatic ties with DPRK and commissioned sanctions to this state (Chang & Gordon, 2016. It
has been hard trying to convince this nation to stop its nuclear plans. These plans are a major
threat to the global stability and security forcing the United States one of the superpowers to
initiate a dialogue. Kim Jong-un’s regime had provoked the United States in particular through
their implication that their ballistic capabilities must be felt globally.
The first interest that the US has is to bring Pyongyang into a leverage and stop these
provocations and threats. Despite the sanctions slapped on its diplomatic ties, DPRK had not
agreed to come to a negotiating table (Chang, 2016). The other interest that the United States has
over this negotiation is to stop future endeavors of countries like Iran who have been ignoring the
non-proliferation treaty (NPT). However, this conundrum has forced Trump’s administration to
use DPRK allies to stop further escalation from these threats.
The major interest that DPRK has is trying to restore its image and its fragile internal
condition with South Korea. It is understood that DPRK is pursuing this mission having lost in
the Korean War back in 1950 and 1953. The nation had several missiles launched, nine in total
for a period less than five years. However, this feeling of weakness grew when Kim Jong-Un
took over the reign and changed the constitution claiming that it was his father’s bequest to
declare DPRK a nuclear state. Economic and nuclear development were his priorities while
changing the constitution (Snyder, 2016).

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The Obama’s administration had initiated a six-party talk but the implementations of the
agreements reached were stalled. DPRK took advantage of this stall and continued to implement
its missile and nuclear program with the view that no agreement had been reached (Rinehart,
Nikitin & Chanlett-Avery, 2016). One of the officials on Pyongyang’s regime had asserted that
their common interest was not to come to a negotiating table but to restore the vital rights and the
sovereignty over the hostile US nuclear threat policy that had lasted about 50 years (Mullen,
2015).
The Korean peninsula has been under military threat and DPRK has been calling for
negotiated talks to defuse this threat and restore their trust between itself and South Korea. On a
keen eye, Pyongyang’s regime has been coming to a negotiating table only to buy time and
continue testing and building their nuclear weapons (Kim Tae-woo, 2016). Despite agricultural
and economic reforms announced in 2014, the country is still impoverished as the country is
keen on restoring its survival on the tie. According to Noland (2016), food security has been an
advantage to the privileged elite but a chronic insecurity for non-elites.
Power Position and the Rights of These Two Parties
The new American government elected in 2009 had promised to eliminate national
security threats by entering into negotiated talks with regimes like DPRK. In that particular year,
North Korea had conducted its 2nd ballistic test. This had forced the United Nations council on
security to slap sanctions on North Korea. The United States had embraced these sets of
sanctions but later abandoned this approach and called for a ‘strategic patience’ policy that did
not bear any fruits (Green, 2016).
These actions forced DPRK to launch 2 long-range missiles and a 3rd nuclear test in
2013. DPRK’s defense commission uttered that it would continue testing these weapons to fight

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against the United States their common enemy (Griffiths, 2016). Unlike the Bush and Clinton’s
regime that had adopted a foreign policy against North Korea, Iran and Iraq, Obama’s
government had turned out to be an inconvenient proposition that enemies had turned into
friends.
The American government piled pressure on DPRK to return to the six-party talks. The
major aspects of this strategy were to convince Pyongyang’s regime to denuclearize in close
coordination with allies like South Korea and Japan and convincing China to pile pressure on
DPRK through sanctions and interdictions. However, the sanctions that were applied toward
DPRK were lesser compared to the ones applied to Iran.
According to Stanton (2015), the American policy was meant to bring DPRK to its senses
but not its knees. The American government had built this approach bearing in mind that the rate
of a nuclear test by Pyongyang’s regime was not rapid to be capable of striking the American
boundaries (Chang, 2016). The United States had accused DPRK of human rights abuses and
nuclear proliferation. This policy adopted measures to bar dollar transactions in close connection
to Pyongyang and no bank whether American and foreign would handle these deals.
According to Philipp (2016), the power that the American government had over DPRK
was to involve Pyongyang in the diplomatic ties, pressurize Pyongyang through sanctions and
determents. However, these attempts were frustrated by the Chinese economic ties with the
DPRK. It was very hard to convince DPRK to denuclearize without impinging Chinese
economic and commercial engagements (Konishi, 2011).

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What Happened In the Past and Why the Negotiations Are Where They Are Today
The first approach that saw the progress of the negotiations to a state that they are in
today was to engage China. China shares a long land border that was used to support Pyongyang
with oil and food supplies. The initial step was to negotiate with China to bring an end to the
threats in the peninsula. The major road to this state passes through Beijing and China was used
to deliver this common plan to DPRK in matters that interested this regime (Stravidis, 2016).
China was keen not to break their bilateral relations and it was interested in the status quo
present in DPRK as it is a buffer zone. China knew that the turmoil that would arise would
spread to its territory. It advised the US and North Korea to come to the negotiating table to end
these bilateral issues. China agreed to enforce sanctions completely and fully in an economic and
strategic dialogue headed by Xi Jinping in Beijing. China agreed to interrupt the flow of
materials such as valves, vacuum pumps, computers and uranium hexafluoride cylinders (Snyder
& Byun, 2016).
The Terminal High Altitude Area Defense drafted in Washington forced the Chinese
government to cooperate. Wang Yi, the Chinese minister of foreign affairs reiterated that this
move would go beyond their defense and reach other regions apart from the peninsula.
Pyongyang who rose into power in 2011 had refused to denuclearize with a motive of restoring
the pride of sovereignty in the peninsula (Chang & Gordon, 2016. There has been a missile and
nuclear negotiations from 1994 to 2012 and successive American regimes had held the talks to
halt the building and testing of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. In this timeframe, these
two parties have held a series of four major negotiations. These are the bilateral leap day deal
held in 2012, the six-party deal held from 2003 to 2009, bilateral missile negotiations conducted

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from 1996 to 2000 and the agreed framework to defuse nuclear weapons instituted from 1994 to
2002 (Nikitin, 2010).
Negotiation Options Available For These Parties
After the collapse of the leap day talks in 2012, North Korea continued testing its ballistic
missiles and nuclear weapons. Available negotiation options for the United States include
elements of denuclearization moratoria such as verification of weapons stocks, freezing of
facilities for nuclear production, dismantling of nuclear testing premises and pledges not to sell
nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles to other nations. North Korea should then request for
security concessions and economic incentives as discussed in the leap day agreement and the six-
party talks (Nikitin, 2010).
Having tested ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons, the North Korea leader has
achieved the capabilities he needed and is in a better negotiating position. After all, North Korea
should be receptive and less aggressive since it has the capability of launching a long-range
missile that can strike the United States territory. However, the United States should stop the
food supplies it has been providing to North Korea to make it food insecure and come to a
negotiating table. The major bargain available is the sanctions removal and economic benefits in
exchange of missile dismantlement and nuclear weapons limitations to end this ceasefire (Lukin
& Zakharova, 2018).
Despite the North Korea leader not pulling out of the agreement, analysts believe that
talks are the solutions to ending conflicts. The United States should employ diplomacy since
there would be a loss of life if a conflict escalates from the restrictions discussed above. A center
for strategic and international studies in 2017 conducted a research on US-DPRK negotiations

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and found out that provocations did not bear any fruits as North Korea continued producing and
testing these arsenals (Philipp & Elisabeth 2016.
Lastly, previous agreements with this nuclear states have produced some tangible
benefits. The shutting down of the plutonium nuclear plant in Yongbyon and subjecting it to
international monitoring have slowed the development of these weapons. This was from the
agreed framework of 1994 to 2002 and a further moratorium abiding by a six-party talks from
1999 to 2006. Some of these benefits have been achieved before Kim Jong-un became the leader
for DPRK (Chang & Gordon, 2016. The United States should focus on these partial
developments to materially slow the nuclear weapons and missiles development by DPRK.
Recommendations on Improving These Negotiations
The United States and its allies ought to seek limited goals which are achievable rather
than continue inducing sanctions and determents. North Korea had reiterated severally that it
would not stop producing these arsenals unless the United States lifts these sanctions. Therefore,
to lower tensions and stop nuclear developments, a near-term goal should be adopted. This
involves freezing of missile and nuclear programs and continued international monitoring of
nuclear production plants (Panda, 2017).
On my view, I believe that confidence-building measures should be given the first
priority over missiles and nuclear weapons agreements. The continued pressure on North Korea
to abide by the agreements could escalate conflicts causing military intervention. Some
transparency measures and hotlines like the ones between US and Soviet Union (cold war) and
the ones between Pakistan and India. Again, resuming the contact channels could reduce
inadvertent and miscalculation which could escalate conflicts (Bandow, 2018).

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Recommendations on the Possible Course of Action
A possible course of action that could be addressed to end this nuclear production is to
focus on other contentious issues. These are the North Korea’s conventional forces, its biological
and chemical weapons, building the confidence levels with measures like increasing the
transparency between the United States and DPRK to prevent conflict arising on this Korean
peninsula. Others include releasing of United States citizens detained in North Korea, sports,
educational and cultural exchange (Pak, & HASS, 2017). Finally, searching the remains of US
MIA servicemen who died during the Korean War should begin. Also, the development of
humanitarian assistance should be instituted. Another vital issue that can be addressed is the
reunification of the North Korean relatives with American based Koreans.
There are preconditions to be considered before these negotiations can be successful. The
United which is the main beneficially of these negotiations should insist on these preconditions.
In 2017, Trump’s administration reiterated that for US to negotiate with DPRK, it must be ready
to negotiate in good faith. Trump in 2017 speech emphasized that for a total, verifiable and
complete denuclearization should begin with a halt of North Korea aggressive regime. North
Korea agreed to dialogue if other nations dropped their preconditions. First, the United States
should stop protecting South Korea while Russia and China should drop their suspensions
(Zaharia, 2016). If these preconditions are met, I have the view that North Korea will be ready to
dialogue and bring an end to its nuclear advancements.

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