English Quiz 148

(English Quiz 148)

1. For all of its pomp and circumstance—the police-escorted limousines cruising unimpeded through capital cities, the grand conference rooms, the hordes of assistants and aides—international diplomacy can be a grindingly tough and draining business. For three years, Christopher Hill, the lead U.S. negotiator in the six-party talks on denuclearizing North Korea, had sought a Grand Bargain with Pyongyang, only to be frustrated at every turn. Finally, in the early hours of Feb. 13, that changed. Thanks in part to the Chinese, who played the stern taskmaster during the latest round of negotiations in Beijing ("they kept us up very late," Hill later joked), the State Department diplomat was able to return to his hotel shortly before 3 a.m. with a deal in hand. Hill wasn't the only U.S. official consumed by the talks. His boss, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, called him 12 times in three days to check the progress of negotiations. "He thought he had a tentative agreement," Rice told reporters at a Feb. 13 press conference in Washington. "And I called him at 4:15 this morning just to make sure."

Q: 試翻 "For three years, ... at every turn."

2. When dealing with North Korea, "making sure" is never a bad idea. Going back to 1994, when the Clinton Administration cajoled Pyongyang into promising to abandon its nuclear-weapons program, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il has repeatedly made and then reneged on such accords. But for the Bush Administration, whose officials had once speculated openly about the possibility of forcing Kim from power by cutting off his regime from aid and trade, the agreement signed on Tuesday represented a victory—albeit a small one. Now, the immediate question it faces is simple: Have the U.S. and its four negotiating partners—South Korea, China, Russia and Japan—laid a solid foundation for a lasting deal on North Korea's nukes, or is this agreement, as one former U.S. negotiator puts it, "just another false start, destined to end badly?"

Q: 試翻 "Going back to 1994, ... on such accords."

3. Despite its obvious need for a diplomatic success somewhere, anywhere, given the quagmire in Iraq and the stalemate over Iran's purported nuclear-weapons program, the Administration could not be accused of overhyping what it got in Beijing. This was not a comprehensive solution that could bring about a nuclear-free Korean peninsula—a goal that, Bush aides say, the President has eagerly sought. But it was, Washington insists, an important first step toward that goal—"an early harvest," as U.S. negotiators like to call it. "Little plants come up," Hill says, "and you harvest those immediately."

Q: 試翻 "Despite its obvious need ... got in Beijing."

4. The preliminary nature of the deal is clear enough: North Korea agreed to shut down its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, where it's believed to have produced the fissile material needed to make the six to 10 nuclear weapons Kim is estimated to possess. Pyongyang has also promised to allow international inspectors into the country to verify compliance within 60 days. In return, the North is to receive an emergency shipment of 50,000 tons of fuel oil from the U.S., China, Russia and South Korea. The oil is desperately needed to run electric power plants in the impoverished land. If the North permanently disables the reactor, the deal calls for another 950,000 tons of oil to be donated. Beyond that, it's less clear what North Korea has conceded. The agreement holds out the possibility of an array of unspecified economic and humanitarian assistance flowing to the North, as well as the prospect that the U.S. will remove the country from its list of terrorist-sponsoring states, end its trade sanctions and eventually enter talks to normalize relations. Meanwhile, Pyongyang agreed "to discuss all of its nuclear programs," including any stockpiles of plutonium already gleaned from the Yongbyon reactor. At her Feb. 13 press conference, Rice emphasized the phrase "all nuclear programs." She says the U.S. and its partners want the North to dismantle both its plutonium-based weapons program and a suspected uranium-enrichment program. "Everybody understands what 'all' means," she says. But Pyongyang, after first admitting to the uranium program when confronted about it by the U.S. in 2002, has since denied its existence—and may well have hidden it away deep inside a mountain somewhere in the countryside. Rice insisted that "we're going to pursue the issue of the highly enriched-uranium program." But if Kim decides not to "discuss" this issue, as the agreement demands, how will the U.S. and its partners react?

Q: 試翻 "Beyond that, ... flowing to the North."