North Korea is ready to hold talks to solve the nuclear crisis without the recognition of its nuclear power status as a pre-condition for the talks,” Sputnik International reported last week, summarizing the views of a delegation of Russian lawmakers who had just visited Pyongyang.
If true, the legislators from the State Duma, by merely showing up in the North Korean capital at the end of last month, achieved a critical diplomatic breakthrough that has eluded, among others, Beijing, Washington, and Seoul. Up to now, Pyongyang has insisted on being recognized as a nuclear weapons state before negotiations begin.
So is the statement from Sputnik true? Or is it, like so many others from the Moscow-based news agency, Putinesque disinformation?
Sputnik’s report is most likely false, but its falsity reveals an important truth about the Kremlin’s ambition with regard to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
Vladimir Putin, apparently, wants to put himself at the center of the international community’s efforts to defuse the North Korean crisis. Think the Russian is acting responsibly? No, he’s not.
The big takeaway from the visit of the Russian delegation, if you believe Sputnik, is that Moscow is uniquely qualified to broker a deal to end the stalemate. “They [the North Koreans] are ready to talk and to hold talks,” said Kazbek Taisayev, head of the Russian delegation. “But they obviously mistrust everyone, except for Russia. My impression is that only Russia could act as a guarantor of such talks.”
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