U.S. Relations With the People's Republic of China (2008)

U.S. Department of State

Interview With the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board

Secretary Condoleezza Rice
New York, New York
June 19, 2008

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QUESTION: The election of Ma Ying-jeou in Taiwan seems to fundamentally change the relationship between Taiwan and China. Doesn't that open up an opportunity to improve relations with Taiwan, given the relations between Taipei and Beijing?

SECRETARY RICE: I think it will. Look, our relations with Taiwan are not -- are not bad. We were -- we were concerned that some of the things that Chen Shui-bian tended to do were just outright provocative and we had to say so. You know, the referendum was just provocative. But there's nothing now wrong with -- we've been encouraging the Chinese and the Taiwanese to try to improve cross-strait relations.

I think our role needs to be to encourage that, but also, to remind everybody that the United States has a relationship with Taiwan as well, and that we want to see things like Taiwan have real space in the international community, like through the WHO, and that we also want to make sure that China understands that it's not just provocative behavior on the part of Taiwan that we would oppose, but provocative behavior on the part of China. So I think we'll see how it comes out. But yes, I think it (inaudible) possibly change their dynamic.

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QUESTION: (Inaudible) would kill me if I didn't ask. The -- you said yesterday that North Korea is going to release its nuclear --

SECRETARY RICE: It's going to give a declaration to China, we believe. That's the expectation.

QUESTION: The key -- one key issue is plutonium and how much they have versus -- how much they declare versus how much we think they have. I guess my question is, what gives you any confidence that their declaration will be complete and honest, when they won't even admit in public that they're proliferating this area?

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QUESTION: But you (inaudible) -- will you insist on spot, unannounced inspections anywhere in North Korea?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, what -- on this plutonium issue, we just need to go to the reactor. And I'm told by -- that -- by the experts it's kind of like the rings of a tree. You can tell what they -- made with that plus access. And so that's what we're going to do.

We are working out with our allies a verification protocol for what else needs to be done. But let me say a word about both the HEU and the Syrian proliferation issue. Look, I think it's deeply -- look, I was a part of the decision-making group that decided to go to them and say, you've got an alternative way to make nuclear weapons. And that's a real problem, the HEU decision of 2002. And I think it was the right decision. And I'm sorry that they walked out of the Agreed Framework, but it was the right decision.

The problem on -- so I'm convinced that there is -- that they have been either seeking or have gotten or have done something on the highly enriched uranium side. The problem is we don't actually know what they've done. I will tell you that the more we dig into it and the more we actually get -- talk to them about it, the more concerning it is. But we're actually learning more through this process about it than we would have known through our intelligence, because it is an opaque, closed, difficult place. HEU is by its very nature hard to know what's going on. I mean, we have inspectors all over the Iranians and it's still hard to know what's going on. And so the question I would ask is: Should we really stop the process of what I would call excavating about this HEU program? And I think we will learn more about this HEU program through these discussions with them, through insisting that they give us things like the tubes, which -- the aluminum tubes, which they did; insisting that they let us interview personnel and so forth. So I'd like to keep this process going.

Similarly on proliferation, I have no idea if the Syrian case is the tip of the iceberg, the end of the story. I really don't know. But I think we've got a much better chance of putting a collar around North Korean proliferation, finding out more about it, punishing it if it's continuing, if we are engaged with the Chinese, who have agreed to set up the proliferation working group within the six parties, than if we're out there on our own trying to follow intelligence leads. And, frankly, with an opaque country like that, you don't get very much.

So I see the process as doing three things to the different parts of it. Because we know a lot about the plutonium program over the last 30 years, I think we can essentially get them out of the plutonium business -- making plutonium business, by disabling and ultimately dismantling their infrastructure for plutonium. We can find out how much they made, and it is my -- our intention in phase three to deal with the outcome of those activities. That means whatever the -- finding whatever they made, finding out whatever devices they put it in, finding out whether it was weaponized, and trying to denuclearize them on that front.

In order to do that, we have given up 130,000 tons of fuel oil, we resolved the Macao issue and gave them back $25 million even though because they were -- because of their activities they still can't access the international financial system, and we have promised that if the declaration can be verified -- you know, is verifiable, is accurate and complete, which is why I put a lot of emphasis on the verification piece, not what they write down but on the verification piece -- then we'll take them off the terrorism list and the Trading with the Enemy Act. That's what we've given up.

There are so many sanctions on North Korea for other things, for human rights, for Security Council, for general bad guy. There are so many other sanctions that neither of those lists is going to matter.

Now, we also have to get a handle on what happened with their highly enriched uranium program. And what they said is, we acknowledge that you have concerns and we acknowledge or accept that you gave us information, and we promise to sit and answer questions about it and to make (inaudible). All right, let's test it. Let's go down that road. Because I don't have any other way to find out what they did on highly enriched uranium. No other way. We know more now in the several months that we've been dealing with this about their highly enriched uranium program than we did in all the work we did before.

And on proliferation, it's the same sort of thing. You will notice that when the public rollout of the Syrian reactor incident came out, the North Koreans said nothing. So their acknowledgment stands. I'd be the first to say it's not perfect. But you're dealing with a very difficult regime, and I'd like to put them out of the plutonium business and I'd like to excavate these other two.

QUESTION: On the inspections, China is leading the group.

SECRETARY RICE: Yes.

QUESTION: They're not going to be the only people inspecting?

SECRETARY RICE: No, we're -- as a matter of fact, we are the ones who are inspecting. In fact, it's not even an IAEA team. It's an American team with Russia and China.

QUESTION: Will that be the case moving forward?

SECRETARY RICE: Yes.

QUESTION: And we'll have the capacity for essentially unannounced onsite inspections where they say, we'd like to look under this rock?

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah, that's what we're talking through now. Obviously, we'll want to get as much of that as possible. I think this is going to be a process. It's going to take a while to get there.

I just want to assure you, I have not lost my bearings about the North Korean regime. Okay? I've seen regimes like this before. They're difficult. They're opaque. And you would be making a serious mistake to trust what they say.

To my mind, you would also be making a serious mistake to go back to the point at which we were not able to raise questions about -- along with the Chinese and -- particularly the Chinese and the South Koreans, who have real leverage, about all of their activities. And to put them in a situation where if they violate agreements, they're violating them with the United States, with Russia, with China, with Japan, with South Korea.

I know there are people who say they will never give up their nuclear weapons. That may well be the case. But I don't know any other way to test the proposition than to continue down this road. And we have backloaded benefits. There has been -- there's no economic assistance. There's food aid, but we consider that starving people. There's no economic assistance. There's no political normalization. I haven't been there yet. There is -- none of that has taken place, and they've already shut down the reactor, disabled it, and begun giving us the verification means that we need. And I think that's worth doing. But this is step by step. There's not going to be that big deal until this country is denuclearized. And knowing that it's denuclearized is going to take some work and is going to take a while.

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