HONOLULU -- Let's not open up the champagne too quickly! The announcement that North Korea finally has agreed to attend multilateral talks "to resolve the nuclear issue" is good news indeed . . . if they actually show up at the yet to be scheduled meeting. But sitting down at the table, as important as this is, puts us no closer to a resolution than we were yesterday and could make matters worse, depending on how North Korea, and the other five parties (the United States, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia), approach the negotiations.
Has North Korea finally seen the light? Has Pyongyang become convinced that cooperating -- or at least appearing to cooperate -- will be more advantageous than threatening World War III?
More importantly, is it prepared, as it claims, to give up its (real or imagined) nuclear weapons in return for the Bush administration's promised (but not fully articulated) "bold approach"? Or will the negotiating table merely provide Pyongyang with one more venue for making its unreasonable demands and one more opportunity to drive a wedge among and between the other participants?