THAILAND: U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE MADELEINE ALBRIGHT HOLDS HISTORIC TALKS WITH NORTH KOREAN FOREIGN MNISTER PAEK NAM-SUN AT ASEAN SUMMIT IN BANGKOK
Record ID:
222927
THAILAND: U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE MADELEINE ALBRIGHT HOLDS HISTORIC TALKS WITH NORTH KOREAN FOREIGN MNISTER PAEK NAM-SUN AT ASEAN SUMMIT IN BANGKOK
- Title: THAILAND: U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE MADELEINE ALBRIGHT HOLDS HISTORIC TALKS WITH NORTH KOREAN FOREIGN MNISTER PAEK NAM-SUN AT ASEAN SUMMIT IN BANGKOK
- Date: 28th July 2000
- Summary: BANGKOK, THAILAND (JULY 28, 2000) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. SV: U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE MADELEINE ALBRIGHT AND NORTH KOREAN FOREIGN MINISTER PAEK NAM-SUN SHAKE HANDS ACROSS TABLE 0.05 2. MV: MEETING IN PROGRESS 0.12 3. ALBRIGHT WALKS TO MICROPHONE AFTER MEETING 4. PUSH IN/WS/SCU: SOUNDBITE (English) US SECRETARY OF STATE MADELINE ALBRIGHT WALKING TO MICROPHONE AFTER MEETING AND SAYING: "Good afternoon. As you know I have just met with Foreign Minister Paek of the Democratic Peoples Republic of North Korea. This was the first bilateral meeting at the ministerial level ever held between our two countries. Its purpose was to enable the Foreign Minister and I to get acquainted and to reaffirm our interest in more normal ties and to touch briefly on core issues we have been discussing for some time. I told the Foreign Minister that the United States welcomes the DPRK's decision to participate in the ASEAN regional forum, because his country has the potential to contribute in important ways to a more stable Asia Pacific, and that we were encouraged by his government's recent efforts to expand diplomatic contacts with other nations and by the moratorium on long range missile testing. I also was direct about American concerns about all aspects of the missile threat, nuclear weapons related activities and the importance of achieving the goals of the agreed framework. I also said that the United States fully supports the intensified inter-Korean dialogue now underway. We understand that change can only come over time, but we believe the process of mutual engagement will do much to address the needs and aspirations of all Koreans. My meeting today with Foreign Minister Paek constitutes a substantively modest but symbolically historic step away from the sterility and hostility of the past towards a more direct and promising approach towards resolving difference and establishing common ground. I remain realistic in expectations and firmly committed to coordination with our allies, I am also somewhat more hopeful than before about the prospect for long term stability on the Korean peninsula and throughout the region" (3 SHOTS) 2.34 5. WS: CAMERAMEN AND JOURNALISTS LISTENING 2.40 6. SCU: SOUNDBITE (English) US SECRETARY OF STATE MADELINE ALBRIGHT: "I made very clear that it was important to get past the fifty years of hostility, and that we needed to look towards the future." 2.49 7. WS: EXTERIOR GOVERNMENT HOUSE 2.54 8. SV: THAI PRIME MINISTER CHUAN LEEKPAI AND U.S.SECRETARY OF STATE MADELEINE SHAKE HANDS 3.00 9. CLOSE UP HANDSHAKE, ALBRIGHTS WALKS AWAY 3.10 10. WIDE OF MEDIA 3.14 11. WIDE SHOT OF THAI PRIME MINISTER CHUAN LEEKPAI'S SPEECH 3.19 12. MV: OTHER FOREIGN MINISTERS LISTEN TO SPEECH 3.23 13. PAN: ALBRIGHT WALKS INTO SHANGRI-LA HOTEL, VENUE FOR ASEAN MEETINGS IN BANGKOK 3.30 14. SV: CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTER TANG JIAXUA ARRIVING AND MEETING ALBRIGHT 3.40 15. SV/APN: ALBRIGHT AND TANG AT MEETING, COUPLE SHAKING HANDS (2 SHOTS) 3.48 16. SV: JAPANESE FOREIGN MINISTER YOHEI KONO AND INDONESIAN FOREIGN MINISTER ALWI ABDURRAHMAN SHIHAB SHAKE HANDS 3.58 17. PAN: ALBRIGHT ARRIVES 4.04 18. SV'S: ALBRIGHT MEETS CAMBODIAN FOREIGN MINISTER HOR NAM HONG (2 SHOTS) 4.16 19. SV: OF ALBRIGHT 4.22 20. PAN: MINISTERS AT MEETING 4.33 21. SCU: CHINESE FOREIGN MINISTER TANG JIAXUAN 4.37 22. WIDE OF MEETING 4.43 23. SV: ALBRIGHT SHAKES HANDS WITH SOUTH KOREAN FOREIGN MINISTER LEE JOUNG-BINN 4.52 24. MV: MEDIA 4.56 25. SV: ALBRIGHT SHAKES HANDS WITH LEE 5.00 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 12th August 2000 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: BANGKOK, THAILAND
- Country: Thailand
- Reuters ID: LVA2YNG36MWN4KDF2B21GG0L7NNC
- Story Text: United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright
has held historic talks with North Korean Foreign Minister
Paek Nam-sun at an Asian diplomatic conference.
An historic handshake across a table Friday (July 28)
ended almost 50 years of silence between the two countries.
Albright and Paek met on the fringes of the ASEAN summit
in Bankok in the highest level talks between the United States
and North Korea since the Korean war.
The meeting was expected to last 30 minutes and skirt many
of the delicate issues that have divided the two sides over
the past half century.
But it stretched well past its alloted time, exceeding 75
minutes, indicating that some of the thorny issues were being
discussed.
U.S. officials stress the success of this first, tentative, meeting
does not mean they can stop worrying about a missile
programme its intelligence estimates could enable
Pyongyang to strike U.S. territory by the year 2005.
Albright's most important goal in Bangkok on Friday and
Saturday (July 29) is to flesh out Washington's picture of the
Stalinist state whose missile programme helped encourage
President Bill Clinton to consider a multi-billion-dollar
National Missile Defence.
Technically, like South Korea, where it has 37,000 troops,
the United States is still at war with Pyongyang as the
peninsula's 1950-53 conflict ended in a U.N. armistice and not
a peace deal.
The United States wants Pyongyang to turn its moratorium
on test-firing missiles, such as the one it lobbed over Japan
in 1998, into a permanent one.
North Korea remains on the State Department's list of
seven "state sponsors of terrorism" alongside Cuba, Iran,
Iraq, Libya, Sudan and Syria because of a past which includes
an attack on South Korean ministers in Myanmar in 1983 in
which 18 officials, including four ministers, were killed.
Speaking after the talks Albright told reporters she was
increasingly optimistic about the potential for improved
relations with North Korea.
"My meeting today with Foreign Minister Paek constitutes
a substantively modest but symbolically historic step away
from the sterility and hostility of the past towards a more
direct and promising approach towards resolving difference and
establishing common ground. I remain realistic in expectations
and firmly committed to coordination with our allies. I am
also somewhat more hopeful than before about the prospect for
long term stability on the Korean peninsula and throughout the
region", Albright said.
Earlier, Albright was greeted by Thai prime minister
Chuan Leekpai as she arrived for talks with various nations
before the ASEAN summit.
She met with her Chinese counterpart Tang Jiaxuan and
held separate meetings with South Korean Foreign Minister Lee
Joung-binn as well as EU Foreign Affairs Commissioner Chris
Patten on the sidelines of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF).
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