Former Ambassador Richardson becomes intermediary with N. Korea

PRichardson, governor of New Mexico, met with envoys Thursday night.

WASHINGTON -- New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a former U.N. ambassador, became a surprise intermediary between the United States and North Korea, meeting Thursday night in his state with two envoys from the communist country.

"I want to be able to help my country," said Richardson, who was sworn in Jan. 1 as governor. He had visited North Korea on two diplomatic missions while he was still a member of Congress during the 1990s.

The initiative for the meeting was taken by North Korea's deputy U.N. ambassador, Han Song Ryol. It came as the United States was awaiting a response from Pyongyang to meetings held Monday and Tuesday among U.S., South Korean and Japanese officials on the North Korean nuclear situation.

The United States offered in a joint statement to hold talks with North Korea on the dispute over its resumption of a nuclear weapons program.

Richardson greeted the North Koreans outside the governor's mansion in Santa Fe. They shook hands and went inside for what the governor's spokesman described as a three-hour working dinner.

Permission from Powell

North Korean diplomats require U.S. permission to leave New York City, and Secretary of State Colin Powell granted it on Wednesday to facilitate the talks in Santa Fe, N.M. A second diplomat, Mun Jong Chol, was joining Han.

Richardson said before the meeting: "I support the administration's policy. I am going to try to be helpful. I am not an official negotiator. The administration has many channels that they are pursuing with the North Koreans."

State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Powell went over U.S. policy toward North Korea with Richardson. The governor said he planned a second meeting today, and that he had had previous contacts with Han.

White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said the Bush administration expected Richardson to stick to President Bush's policy.

A senior administration official, asking not to be identified, said Thursday night that Richardson was not asked to pass any messages to the North Koreans on behalf of the administration. The official said the administration was looking for signs of North Korean willingness during the meetings to dismantle its nuclear program.

For Richardson, the role of diplomatic troubleshooter is not new.

In 1996, as a New Mexico congressman, he went to North Korea and helped secure the release of an American who was detained for three months on spy charges. In 1994, he helped arrange the freedom of a U.S. soldier whose helicopter had strayed into North Korea.

He also undertook diplomatic forays into Sudan, Cuba and Iraq during his House days. He was sometimes known at the "U.S. ambassador to rogue states."

He served both as U.N. ambassador and energy secretary for the Clinton administration. North Korea may have turned to him after recalling the warmer ties it enjoyed with Washington during that period.

North Korea welcomed former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to its capital, Pyongyang, in October 2000. Bill Clinton gave serious consideration to a visit in the final weeks of his presidency but decided against it. Just a year after Clinton left office, President Bush designated North Korea as part of an "axis of evil."

The Bush administration contends that North Korea acted in bad faith during the Clinton era by carrying out a secret nuclear weapons program in violation of agreements even as it was displaying friendship toward Washington.

At the State Department, Boucher said the United States is insisting that North Korea "promptly and verifiably" dismantle its nuclear weapons programs.

The Bush administration has been hoping international pressure on North Korea will force it to reconsider its nuclear program.

North Korea appears to have scant support from the outside world but the U.S. ambassador to Russia, Alexander Vershbow, told reporters in Washington on Thursday that Russia is in denial about the dangers posed by the nuclear program.

He said Russia was in a position to influence North Korea but was not doing enough.

Later, Vershbow said Russia may have less leverage with North Korea than China, the result of historic ties between China and North Korea. Still, Russia could offer to help North Korea with its energy needs, Vershbow said in remarks at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington research group.

He said the administration had not made such a proposal to Russia, and that U.S. officials have ruled out "rewards" for North Korea to again freeze its weapons programs.