WASHINGTON -- As Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill returns to Northeast Asia for talks with U.S. allies on North Korea's nuclear program, the future of negotiations to resolve this terrifying matter has never been bleaker.
North Korea appears unwilling to return to the six-party process involving both Koreas, the United States, China, Japan, and Russia. The Bush administration has no particularly fresh ideas for wooing Pyongyang back, and in fact understandably rejects the very notion of trying to woo such a regime.
And now China is criticizing the U.S. approach to the talks as insufficiently flexible and diplomatic. North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, knowing that he can continue to trade and receive aid from both China and South Korea, and knowing that U.S. forces are tied down elsewhere with no good options for using force against his country in any event, is unlikely to feel much pressure to change his path.