SAMORE: NEW SOUTH KOREAN 123 AGREEMENT UNLIKELY BEFORE EXPIRATION

Given U.S. concern that granting South Korea reprocessing and enrichment rights will embolden North Korea, it is unlikely that a new civil nuclear agreement with South Korea will be reached before the current deal expires in the spring of 2014, according to a former Obama Administration official.  Negotiations on a new “123” agreement between the United States and South Korea have been ongoing. However, Korea’s desire for pursuing enrichment and reprocessing coupled with U.S. opposition to those measures has been a roadblock to finalizing a new deal. “Washington is concerned that if [the Republic of Korea] develops enrichment and reprocessing for civil purposes, it will give North Korea and excuse to retain its own enrichment and reprocessing for quote unquote peaceful purposes,” Gary Samore, director of Harvard’s Belfer Center and recently Obama’s Coordinator for Weapons of Mass Destruction, said yesterday at a Center for Strategic and International Studies event.

Samore recommended an extension of the current deal as a solution to that hurdle. “If you take politics into consideration plus, as I’ve talked about, the fundamental issues, I think it’s unlikely that a new agreement can be reached. At the same time the expiration of the current agreement would be unacceptable, it would lead to fundamental disruption in nuclear trade,” he said, adding, “My recommendation is that President Obama and [South Korean President Park Geun-hye] should agree to a simple extension of the current agreement for a couple of years to allow more time for the negotiators to try and work out a compromise. Now this extension would have to be approved by both legislatures, but I think both countries could make the case that this is much better than having the agreement break down and it wouldn’t really sacrifice either country’s position.”