China’s Wen Stays Silent on North Korea Blame, Focuses on Peace

Source: Bloomberg By Bomi Lim

May 31 (Bloomberg) -- China’s Premier Wen Jiabao ended two days of talks with his South Korean and Japanese counterparts with a call for calm in the region, resisting pressure to condemn North Korea.

The third annual three-nation summit had planned to discuss economic and political integration. Instead, the sinking of the South Korean warship Cheonan, blamed on Kim Jong Il’s regime, hogged the agenda as tensions on the peninsula rose to the highest in decades amid the North’s threat of “all-out war.”

China’s refusal to join international condemnation of its communist ally may undermine its ambition to counter U.S. influence in Asia by forging closer ties with South Korea and Japan. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Seoul last week, standing alongside President Lee Myung Bak to spell out a “rock solid” commitment to the defense of South Korea.

“The Cheonan case provides a perfect opportunity for the U.S. to tighten its military grip on the region,” said Paik Hak Soon, director of inter-Korean relations at the Seongnam, South Korea-based Sejong Institute. “The U.S. would adamantly want to defend its position against increasing rivalry from China.”

South Korea may take its case against the North to the United Nations Security Council, where China has veto power, as soon as this week, Yonhap News reported yesterday. Lee cut trade ties and barred new investment in the North last week after an international panel concluded the warship was sunk by a North Korean torpedo.

‘War of Aggression’

The charge is a fabrication intended to justify “a war of aggression,” the North’s state-run Korean Central News Agency said yesterday.

North Korea cut off all ties with the South, threatening to sink ships that strayed into its waters and shell South Korean positions if the government went ahead with plans to use loudspeakers to blast propaganda over the border.

The escalating tension roiled financial markets last week. The won fell 3 percent on May 25, the biggest drop in 14 months. The Kospi index dropped 2.8 percent the same day, before recouping its losses later in the week.

“It is the most urgent task to gradually ease tensions following the incident, and especially to avoid conflict,” Wen said yesterday after talks with Lee and Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama on the South Korean resort island of Jeju. China will “help resolve the incident in a way that benefits peace and security.” Wen later traveled to Japan for a further meeting today with Hatoyama.

Troop Presence

The U.S. has 28,500 troops in South Korea, who “are well prepared to deter aggression,” Lieutenant Colonel Angela Billings, a spokeswoman for U.S. forces in Korea, said last week.

Hatoyama cited security threats from North Korea as one of the reasons to stick to a 2006 accord to relocate the Futenma Air Base within the island of Okinawa, 950 miles (1,530 kilometers) south of Tokyo. Hatoyama said on May 28 that President Barack Obama agreed to deepen ties between the U.S. and Japan, where about 50,000 American military personnel are stationed.

The sinking helped “Japanese people to appreciate the importance of security for Japan,” Kazuo Kodama, press secretary of Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said at a briefing on Jeju. “People tend to appreciate more than ever that because of the U.S.-deployed forces, Japan is protected.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and his Japanese counterpart agreed last week to work together on monitoring China’s navy after Japan in April raised concerns about the intentions of Chinese submarines and destroyers spotted in international waters close to Okinawa.

Blood Ties

The U.S. fought on South Korea’s side against North Korea and China during the 1950-1953 conflict, which ended in a cease- fire and left the Korean peninsula in a technical state of war. South Korea’s 680,000-strong military face off with as many as 1.2 million troops across the border in North Korea, which has also built atomic bombs and long-range ballistic missiles that it claims can reach parts of the U.S.

The U.S.-South Korea alliance “was literally born in blood,” according to the U.S. Strategic Digest published last year. That sentiment echoes ties between China and North Korea, also “bound by blood,” according to Paik.

China’s President Hu Jintao hosted Kim Jong Il earlier this month even as indications of the North’s role in the March 26 sinking were growing. Excluding inter-Korean trade, China accounted for 79 percent of North Korea’s international commerce in 2009, according to Seoul-based trade agency Kotra.

The U.S. is joining South Korea in blaming North Korea to “put China into an awkward position and keep hold on Japan and South Korea as its servants,” KCNA said May 28.

“Beijing looks at the region in terms of a zero-sum geopolitics that sees victory in terms of luring South Korea and Japan away from the U.S.,” said William Callahan, professor of international politics at the University of Manchester.