After the collapse of the communist
regime in
The former
On the whole, three
major factors impede Russian-North Korean trade ties and ultimately the whole
structure of relations. The North Korean regime appears insolvent, and suffers
from a severe deficit of hard currency. Thus, North Korean companies strive to
delay payments, and try for special high prices on North Korean goods and low
prices on Russian goods (in previous times this was a form of hidden subsidy
for the DPRK's regime). Secondly, there are problems
of transportation: constantly rising transportation charges, increasingly high
risks of damage and non-delivery of goods, and failure to deliver on time.
Thirdly, Soviet companies previously conducted trade and developed economic
cooperation under inter-governmental agreements. Nowadays such companies have
been turned into joint stock companies, and both they and newly-created
commercial undertakings think it unprofitable to do business with the DPRK.
Under such
circumstances, it is not surprising that some Russian experts argue that today
North Korea cannot be regarded as a serious economic partner, especially taking
into consideration its deep socio-economic crisis. Only if the DPRK could
participate in large subregional projects, like the exploitation of natural gas
in Siberia and Yakutia and its export by pipeline to
China and Korea and through to other countries, might the situation change in
the sphere of Russian-North Korean economic relations.
The demise of the USSR has apparently had
strong implications for Russo-Korean affairs. After the normalisation
of Soviet relations with South Korea two features became characteristic of
Soviet goals on the Korean peninsula: first, a wish to attract South Korean
loans and investment as a partial substitute for Japan, and second, aspiration
to achieve a mediatory role in inter-Korean affairs for the Soviet Union, the
only major power with embassies in both Seoul and Pyongyang. However, neither
of these aims were pursued in Russian foreign policy following the USSR's
demise. Attempts to ameliorate relations with Japan, and a more realistic view
of South Korea's financial and economic potential, demoted the ROK to a much
lower position in Russias priorities. An independent posture in inter-Korean
affairs was also beyond immediate goals.
Koreas low position in Russias foreign
priorities was demonstrated in 1992, when President Yeltsins visit to Seoul
was planned only as an addendum to his trip to Japan, and was easily canceled
along with the Japanese project. It was only Seouls harsh reaction that made
Russia finally plan a separate visit. Besides, like Gorbachevs experience,
failure with Japan forced Russia to reconsider its approach to Seoul, though in
different terms. If Gorbachevs administration viewed the ROK as an important
substitute for unsuccessful economic overtures to Japan, Yeltsin's did not.
It may be noted that Russian-Korean summits in
1992-1994 were predominantly marked with important but symbolic actions
demonstrating Russias new approaches to inherited historic incidents. Measures
like the disclosure of Russian archives on the origins of the Korean war and
the release of the documents to Seoul, intensive investigation of the
shooting-down of flight KAL 007 by a Soviet pilot in 1983 and release of its
flight recorders to Korea were effective steps to appeal to Korean national
feelings and improve the image of the new Russia. Russian assistance in
obtaining UN membership for both Koreas, and later in South Koreas election as
a non-permanent member of the Security Council was very important in raising
the level of understanding and cohesion between Moscow and Seoul.
On the other hand, the ROK saw the South
Korean Russian relationship mostly from the angle of North-South
confrontation and tried to influence Russia's policy towards the DPRKs nuclear and missile programs, demanding it criticise other aspects of North Koreas foreign and
domestic policy. These attempts succeeded to the extent that South Korea
claimed to have brought about a freeze in North Korean-Russian relations.[74]
At the same time bilateral economic
cooperation failed to meet expectations. The 1997 financial crisis reduced
South Korea's activities in the Russian economy, where earlier experience had
already demonstrated a divergence of views between the Korean conglomerates and
Russian authorities on the forms economic cooperation should take. To Korea,
Russia was a source of raw materials and a growing market for Korean industry,
but it needed to overcome the increased protectionism. Russia, on the other
hand, preserved former Soviet priorities for value-adding processing of its raw
materials, and expanding high-technology production on its own soil with
assistance from foreign capital investment. Russian domestic problems, such as
political and economic uncertainties, inconsistent taxation policy, corruption,
crime, and the lack of real efforts to attract foreign investment added to both
countries' early disillusionment with the prospects for economic cooperation.
The aggravation of North Koreas nuclear and missile crisis opened a new
opportunity for Moscow to find new lines of involvement in the Korean
peninsula, reviving earlier expectations of assuming a mediator's role. Two
basic factors had to be overcome to implement the new priorities.
The first major problem was that Russia lost -
in fact, partially abandoned - almost all its leverage on Pyongyang, with
bilateral relations remaining strained and deteriorating after Moscows formal
recognition of Seoul. Russias economic situation certainly prevented
restoration of the former model of assistance to the DPRK, and Russia opted instead
for diplomatic effort. Russia undertook a series of visits to Pyongyang to
elaborate a new treaty to replace that of 1961, which expired in 1996. It also
tried to present a new image of a nation suitable for the role of unprejudiced
arbiter - especially important for isolated North Korea in advocating its
interests before the international community. Strong Russian opposition to UN
sanctions was to reinforce these arguments.
It should be stressed that it was Russia that
first found a formula for reviewing North Korea's nuclear problems without
impinging upon the interests of any nations affected. This was a proposed 6+2
international conference (two Koreas, United States, China, Japan, Russia plus
United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Agency), where the basic
problem was that the formula for a forum was proposed without indicating any
precise measures that should be taken. They were supposed to be prepared by the
conference, a rather long and not very effective process, especially when nations
without much experience in multilateral negotiations were included. A practical
approach easily combined with the proposed international mechanism was later
found at talks between former US President Carter and the North Korean
leadership, assuming the abandonment of North Korea's independent nuclear
efforts and IAEA control over its nuclear facilities traded for building a
light water nuclear power station under international financing, later
developing into Korean Energy Development Organisation
(KEDO).
Several factors determined Russias initial
enthusiasm for the idea. The international nature of the proposed program
corresponded with Russias desired list of probable participants, thereby
giving Moscow a valuable opportunity to express its views on the issue.
Russias expectations of becoming a provider of nuclear reactors were even more
significant. Indeed, Russia had rather strong grounds for this expectation.
South Korean reactors were unacceptable to Pyongyang for ideological reasons,
and American-made reactors considered undesirable on the same grounds; North
Korea clearly stated that it would opt for Russian or European nuclear plants.
Besides, Russia already had experience of North Koreas nuclear programme. Investigations into a civil nuclear energy
program had been conducted in the late 1980s, and on-the-spot preparatory work
had been fulfilled, before Russia declined further participation in 1992 due to
North Koreas lack of funds. In the meantime Russia had seriously evaluated the
possibilities of providing nuclear plants to North Korea under international
financing as an important source of international assistance in settling not
only the North Korean issue, but also problems in Russias nuclear industry, by
giving the latter a chance to earn money instead of borrowing. Taking all these
circumstances into account, Russian reactors would be less expensive than any
competing project, a fact important to KEDO's
finances.
The major obstacle turned out to be Seouls
insistence on providing South Korean-made products, irrespective of North
Korean objections. This resulted in adoption of a compromise solution:
disguising South Korean products as American. Discussion on this issue
protracted the negotiations and made the agreement more vulnerable to possible
obstruction, as had former inter-Korean agreements, most notably that on the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula (1992). The only
role left open for Russia was the highly unacceptable one of forcing North
Korea to accept the plan elaborated in Washington and Seoul in opposition to
priorities clearly defined by Moscow and Pyongyang.
The final decision to proceed with the KEDO
scheme was taken under strong pressure from South Korea, within the logic of
its strategic line. While an outside power can make a clear distinction between
the problems of security on the Korean peninsula, on the one hand, and the
reunification of Korea, on the other, giving priority to the former, for the
ROK the two issues tend to be conflated and agreements on security enhancement
are usually transformed into an instrument to serve the goal of reunification
with great importance attached to the demonstration effect and direct access
to North Korean territory. Hence for both Russia and South Korea the proposed
KEDO scheme implied additional political problems, finally leading to feelings
of dissatisfaction on both sides.
Russias sense of isolation in Korean affairs
grew much stronger in 1996 after the U.S-ROK initiative by Presidents Clinton
and Kim Young Sam on four-party talks to prepare arrangements to replace the
cease-fire agreement of 1953, abrogated by Pyongyang and then by China under
North Korean pressure. Certainly, the new proposal maintained the logic of the
cease-fire, with only four parties involved (in fact ROK President Syngman Rhee had refused to
accept it in 1953), and was urgently demanded as no legal framework existed to
regulate the situation in the demilitarised zone
after North Koreas unexpected move. Yet Moscow was irritated by the proposal that
only two outside powers, the USA and China, should be international guarantors
of the status-quo on the Korean peninsula, a proposal about which neither the
ROK nor the USA consulted or even informed Russia, intensifying the impression
made by the rejection of its plans for KEDO that Russia was being marginalised.[75]
A further sense of declining influence on the
situation on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia as a whole, derived
from Seouls indifference to all Russias efforts to improve its image in South
Korea and establish productive political cooperation. This further clouded
South Korean-Russian relations. Russias initial reaction was moderated by the
fact that the four-party talks initiative made no progress as it was silenced
by Pyongyang, and by new ROK initiatives presented by the former ambassador to
Moscow, Kim Sok Kyu. The
new South Korean proposal has revived the idea presented by then president Roh Tae Woo to the UN General Assembly in 1991, calling for
the establishment of a security cooperation system in Northeast Asia with
participation of both Koreas, the United States, China, Russia, Japan, and
possibly Canada and Mongolia.
This idea clearly overlapped with previous
Russian initiatives, and certainly coincided with Moscows vision of a
potential role in the region through participation in regional institutions.
Besides, it certainly met Russia's general line of 1996-97, of speeding up
confidence-building arrangements and troop reductions on its border with China,
and its overtures to Japan aimed at promoting cooperation in security areas. In
that context the ROK idea, with its primary stress on Korean affairs, could
assist Russia to expand her recent approaches towards China and Japan to Korea,
thereby covering the whole Northeast Asian region and creating an institutional
framework of sub-regional security enhancement systems, one of its current key
objectives.
It would appear that the idea of multilateral
security cooperation, aimed at reducing tensions and increasing confidence, is
creating a new basis for Russian political cooperation with ROK. This coincides
with efforts to revive dialogue with Japan and overcome a narrow orientation
towards the strategic partnership with China, without disrupting it.
The attempt to
revive North KoreanRussian ties should be considered in the same context. In
April 1996 a high-ranking Russian official delegation was sent to Pyongyang.
Though the head of the delegation, Vitaly Ignatenko, then vice-premier, ranked only seventh among the
deputies to then prime-minister Chernomyrdin, and was not in charge of foreign
political or economic relations, the mere fact that a member of the government
was overseeing ties between the two countries demonstrated Russias resolve to
restore at least economic relations with North Korea.
Here an observer can
see implementation of the new policy adopted by the Russian Federation on the
eve of the 1996 presidential election. Major components of this policy, as
stated by then Foreign Minister Evgeny Primakov, included shifting from following US policy and reestablishing ties with such countries as Iraq, Libya,
North Korea, which should not be turned into international pariahs. An attempt
to avoid the communist opposition's accusation of betraying old friends, was
perhaps the most important incentive.
As has so often been
the case, Russian foreign policy moves were not connected with the
international situation, but appeared to be an annex to domestic policy, based
on certain ideological dogmas. From this point of view, there was nothing
surprising in the fact that a Russian-North Korean meeting opened just after
North Korea unilaterally rejected its obligations over the DMZ. Taking into
consideration that 60-70% of North Korean troops are deployed close to the line
of demarcation, this decision naturally increased tension on the Peninsula.
Still the Russian administration showed that it was none of its business, and
that political and economic issues were much more important in its relations with
its former client.
The Russian
delegation arrived in Pyongyang in April 1996 for the first session of the
inter-governmental commission for trade, economic and scientific cooperation.
It had two major points on its agenda: discussing North Koreas debt problems,
and reviewing the Treaty on friendship relations between the Russian Federation
and DPRK. Russia had suggested a new treaty in late 1995, and the fact that it
proposed one implied that the level of bilateral relations had been officially
downgraded. The new treaty was drafted to replace the alliance treaty of 1961,
which was effectively abandoned in 1991, as it did not match the new
geopolitical reality. Despite its lower level of commitment, the new treaty was
a response to Russian perceptions that South Korea, having achieved its aim of
establishing political relations with Russia, did not want to develop bilateral
ties further, and was collaborating with the USA in attempts to block any
Russian moves in the region. It was also an attempt to implement the new
principle of political symmetry on the Korean Peninsula. In September 1996
North Korea submitted its variant of the Treaty.
The new policy
towards North Korea, claimed to be more balanced, more delicate, based
exclusively on Russian national interests, independent of the South Korean
policy was recognition of the new reality: after several years of coolness
between the two countries Russia discovered that its influence on the Korean
Peninsula had been drastically reduced. Pyongyang had opened a dialogue of its
own with Washington. Moreover, Russia found itself left out of the frame of the
quadrilateral meeting on Korea (ROK, DPRK, USA and PRC).
Russia had never
accepted the idea of a quadrilateral meeting on Korea, and responded by suggesting
a multilateral conference with participants including the DPRK, Russia, China,
South Korea, the USA, Japan, the IAEA and United Nations. However, some groups
in Russia lobbied for the quadrilateral meeting, as they thought it an
important measure towards normalising the situation on the Korean Peninsula,
and expected it to lead to replacement of the 1953 armistice agreement by a
peace treaty. However, the Russian government's position is that the armistice
agreement should remain in force until a new peace structure is established on
the Korean Peninsula.
In trying to
establish a new legal basis for Russian-North Korean relations through a new
Treaty, Russia was out to show that it still had some influence on the
Peninsula, and was conducting independent policies towards both Korean states.
At the same time it tried to ignore scandalous incidents in the DMZ and coastal
waters, dismissing them as an internal affair between the Korean states. But
North Korea kept a watchful eye on the development of Russian-South Korean
ties. For example, in September 1996 it expressed dissatisfaction with Russia's
agreement to supply South Korea with armoured cars and T-80 tanks as part of a
deal for partial repayment of loans totalling US$ 1.47 billion (450.7 million.
was to be repaid in military equipment).[76]
Russia nevertheless continued its efforts to enter the South Korean arms
market. Among them was the Sukhoi corporations
competition with American Boeing and French Dasseau to supply a modern multi-purpose
fighter for the South Korean Air
Force.[77] The Russian
bidder offered its advanced Su-35 fighter,[78]
but its bid was unsuccessful. This added to the overall disappointment over the
cooperation with South Korea.
North Korea reacted
favourably to changes in Russias approach towards Korean Peninsula issues. In
February 2000 the Russian Foreign Minister visited Pyongyang where the two
nations signed a new Friendship Treaty. In response, North Koreas Foreign
Minister visited Moscow in April 2000. The background to these meetings was a
recognition that Moscow had erred in rejecting Russian-North Korean
cooperation. Russia proclaimed restoration of bilateral ties with the DPRK
alongside developing mutually beneficial cooperation with the Republic of
Korea.
In developing this
line, Russia and North Korea exchanged visits by their national leaders. After Putins visit to Pyongyang (July 2000), where he tried to
persuade Kim Jong Il to end his missile program, Kim
undertook a nine-day train trip across Russia, and on 4 August 2001 arrived in
Moscow for a five-day official visit. While some observers claim that Putin's frequent trips abroad are less for official
purposes than opportunities for tourism, the North Korean leader, on the
contrary, does not habitually go abroad, except to Beijing. This greatly
increased the significance of his visit in the eyes of Russian officials. Kim's
father - Communist North Korea's founder, the late Kim Il Sung - made the same
extended train journey on an official visit to the Soviet Union in 1986. The
younger Kim followed the same route, but in a different country.
[74] G. Bulychev,
D. Kulkin, Rossiia I Yuzhnaya
[75] Russian experts later advanced an explanation that
KEDO was not so important for
[76] The Korean Central News Agency called
[77] G. Charodeev. Su-35 Nad Poluostrovom (SU-35 Over the Peninsula), Izvestia, 15 January 2002, p.2
[78] The Su-35 is a multi-purpose all-weather interceptor,
capable of attacking airborne or ground targets. It is claimed to be more
manoeuvrable than any other comparable aircraft, especially for eluding
missiles fired at it.