From ABC News:
After months of stalling, North Korea offered a glimpse of its secretive nuclear program Thursday and was promptly rewarded by President Bush with an easing of trade sanctions and a move to take the communist state off the U.S. terrorism blacklist.
This is due to the agreement(s) reached with the six-party talks, which have evidently been on-going. Does this mean that the Bush administration was involved with diplomacy? I am surprised, because they have done such a poor job in this area in the past. Maybe the six-party method has forced some sense into the Bush administration foreign policy.
As a refresher, the six parties are: North Korea, South Korea, Japan, The People's Republic of China, the United States, and the Russian Federation.
There is a 45 day, congressionally mandated, waiting period before removing North Korea from the terrorism list. This period will be used for verifying that Korea has complied with the agreements, providing proof of equipment destroyed or dismantled, and quantities of uranium produced.
From MSNBC
"If North Korea continues to make the right choices, it can repair its relationship with the international community," he said. "If North Korea makes the wrong choices, the United States and its partners in the six-party talks will act accordingly." Quoted in both ABC and MNSBC articles.
What does the phrase "the United States and its partners in the six-party talks will act accordingly" mean? Is the Bush administration just working toward another country to attack? Is this some convoluted, backhanded way to get there? Something here just seems fishy to me. Why Korea and why now? Maybe I just have read too many conspiracy theories and should not be worried, as there are so many other countries involved.
Opinions expressed by various political figures:
Both Obama and McCain have issued statements that generally say sanctions should remain in place until everything agreed to can be verified.
Also, from ABC:
Conservative Republicans, who want the U.S. to take an even tougher stance against North Korea, were incensed at Bush's action.
John Bolton was among the quoted that was incensed by this action.
What, no peace-making allowed?
Here are three sources for more details:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...
http://abcnews.go.com/...
I have looked for this to be covered on DailyKos all afternoon, and did not find it. Hopefully, no one else covered it while I was writing this.