South Korean President-Elect Wants Meeting With Kim Jong Il
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: There is action in the standoff now over North Korea's nuclear ambitions. The U.N.'s atomic monitoring group has scheduled an emergency meeting that might unfold sometime next month. That could set the stage for a discussion of the issue by the full U.N. Security Council. Also today, South Korea's president-elect reached out to the north, at some political risk. He talked with our senior Asia correspondent, Mike Chinoy, who is in Seoul this morning, and he is going to bring us up-to-date on what transpired. Good morning, Mike.</s>MIKE CHINOY, CNN SENIOR ASIA CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula. Well, President-Elect Roh Moo-hyun, in his first television interview since winning election last month had a warning for the Bush administration. He told me that only through direct negotiations between the United States and North Korea was there any chance of the Korean nuclear crisis being solved. He said dialogue was the only way, and that is something that, so far, the Bush administration has refused to engage in.</s>ROH MOO-HYUN, PRESIDENT-ELECT, SOUTH KOREA: Even at this point, we believe that North Korea is potentially dangerous, and is still a military foe, and this remains unchanged. But the reason that I insist on dialogue is because there is no way out. Diplomatic pressure, sanctions, or even limited military attacks will all lead to war, and war is not a solution to solving this problem.</s>CHINOY: Paula, the president-elect knows, to underscore this point, has said that as soon as he takes office, he would like to hold a summit meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.</s>ZAHN: So, Mike, did you get the sense from the incoming president that he is optimistic that there would eventually be direct talks between the United States and North Korea?</s>CHINOY: He was cautious, but he said that as far as he was concerned, there is really no other way to proceed and, in this, he is joined by leaders in Japan, in China, and in Russia, all the key players in this part of the world are on the same side, urging the Bush administration to abandon its stance of no negotiations with the North, saying unless the U.S. sits down at the negotiating table with the North Korean regime, there can be no solution and, in the absence of those negotiations, the fear is that the North Koreans will move ahead and begin reprocessing plutonium, something that experts say could, within a matter of months, give the North enough plutonium to make at least a half dozen nuclear weapons. There is also concern that the North might test another missile in the coming weeks as another way to force the U.S. to the bargaining table, and it's in this context that the South Korean leader coming into power next month says it's important to keep this diplomatic process of direct dialogue on track to avoid the situation spiralling out of control -- Paula.</s>ZAHN: Well, we were delighted to share that exclusive interview you got with our audience here on AMERICAN MORNING this morning. Mike Chinoy, appreciate the hard work. Thanks for the update. Il>