Obama Ends First Visit To Asia Focused On North Korean Disarmament

November 19, 2009 7:44 a.m. EST

Seoul, South Korea (AHN) - President Barack Obama focused on nuclear disarmament talks with North Korea during his visit to Seoul, the last stop in his week-long Asian tour.

Obama first met with U.S. embassy officials and staff upon arriving in South Korea, and then held talks with President Lee Myung-bak at the Blue House, the presidential compound in northern Seoul so called for its blue roof tiles.

The two leaders later held a joint press conference in which Obama announced that the small delegation of American envoys that will travel to Pyongyang for Six Party Talks would do so on Dec. 8. The U.S. President then visited American troops at Osan Air Base before leaving for Anchorage, Alaska, where a layover will take him back home.

The State Department announced last week that Amb. Stephen Bosworth, the senior official in charge of all matters regarding North Korean policy, would lead a team to try to resume negotiations on denuclearization. But no date for the trip had been set because negotiations were still underway with Pyongyang about logistics.

The United States has no official ties with Pyongyang, and the decision to hold direct talks with the communist nation comes after recent efforts to engage with Iran, which is also internationally condemned for its nuclear activities, proved fruitful.

China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States are part of negotiations, called Six Party talks, with North Korea about disarmament.

The United States successfully pushed the United Nations Security Council in June to impose tougher sanctions on North Korea in response to the nation's May 25 nuclear test.

Resolution 1874, which passed with a unanimous vote from the 15-member Council, demands that Pyongyang stop all nuclear and missile activity and demands return unconditionally to the Six Party negotiations. It also imposes a complete embargo on the nation's export of military material except small arms, gives Council members the power to inspect vessels suspected of contraband.

Financial sanctions have also been tightened, and member states can freeze transactions and assets related to North Korea's proliferation activities.

North Korea remained defiant despite the sanctions, threatening "all-out war" to any nation that violates its sovereignty. It had earlier ended the 1953 ceasefire agreement ratified after Korean War with South Korea.

Last week, a naval skirmish occurred between North Korea and South Korea, heightening tensions in the peninsula.

The state-run Korean Central News Agency said a South Korean vessel had "intruded [Northern] the waters" and then attacked a North Korean patrol boat "on routine guard duty." "The patrol boat of the north side, which has been always combat-ready, lost no time to deal a prompt retaliatory blow at the provokers," it added.

A day before Obama's visit, the KCNA carried an article from the Rodong Sinmun, the North Korean communist party's newspaper, saying, "The army and people... are dealing merciless blows at the imperialists, countering their reckless moves with the toughest measures. The Korean people are growing stronger in their faith and will to protect socialism to the last from the ever-more undisguised moves of the U.S. imperialists and settle accounts with them without fail."

Obama is expected to arrive at Andrews Air Force Base early in the evening, closing a tour of Asia that began with a visit to Japan to strengthen ties with a new ruling party, a quick stop in Singapore for an APEC Summit, and a two-day trip to China that combined serious discussions on human rights, climate change and the economy, with the sights and sounds of the Great Wall and the Forbidden City.