다음은 미래한국신문 http://www.futurelorea.co.kr 에 있는 기사임. 이 기사와 관련이 있는 LA TIMES 기사를 올릴 것.임 李통일, 남한 좌익세력 대변" 미 한반도 전문 언론인 `도날드 커크` 기자 주장          대다수의 미국 관리들은 한미관계가 이상 없다고 주장하지만 북한 문제에 관한 한 한미간 견해차가 점점 더 심해지고 있는 것으로 나타났다. 미국의 한반도 문제 전문 언론인인 도날드 커크(Donald Kirk) 전 인터네셔널헤럴드트리뷴(IHT)지 기자는 최근 홍콩 ‘아시아타임스’에 기고한 장문의 칼럼에서 “북핵문제, 인권문제, 통상문제에서 한미 양국간의 입장차가 너무 커 곧 봉합할 수 없는 지경에 도달할 것”이라고 주장했다. 커크 기자는 칼럼에서 이종석 통일부 장관이 시종일관 미국에 대한 비난으로 일관하고 있다고 주장했다. 커크 기자는 미국이 북한 핵 문제 해결을 외교적 방식에서 군사적 방식으로 전환한 적이 없음에도 불구하고, 이 장관은 미국의 대북 선제공격을 반대한다고 밝힘으로써 남북 화해에 미국이 악역을 맡고 있다고 여기는 한국의 좌익세력을 대변했다고 비판했다.   한편 커크 기자는 대북 경제 지원에 있어 노무현 대통령과 이종석 통일부 장관이 같은 의견을 공유하고 있으나, 미국은 북한으로 유입되는 식량과 비료가 어느 곳으로 유입되고 있는지 투명성을 요구하고 있다고 지적했다. 그는 미국의 저명한 인권단체인 ‘휴먼 라이츠 워치’(HRW)의 최근 보고서를 인용, 북한에 제공되는 식량과 다른 원조가 북한 주민들에게 전달되는 것이 아니고 북한 지배층에게 가고 있다고 비판했다. HRW는 보고서에서 최소 100만 명에 이르는 주민들이 굶어죽었는데 북한이 다시 식량 배급제로 전환함에 따라 북한에 또 다시 기아 사태가 초래 될 수 있다고 경고했다. 그러나 이 같은 분석에 대해 이 장관은 “적어도 2000년 이후 남한이 북한에 원조를 제공하기 시작한 이래 굶어 죽은 사람은 아무도 없다”며 북한을 두둔했다고 커크 기자는 지적했다. 커크 기자는 개성공단과 관련해 한국과 미국의 시각차가 가장 극명하게 나타나고 있다며 다음과 같이 비판했다. “이종석 통일부 장관을 비롯한 남한 관리들은 개성공단에서 남북한의 경제협력을 찬양하고 약 6000여명의 북한 노동자들에게 자본주의 혜택을 보게 하며 수년 내에 외국 회사들이 50만 명의 북한 노동자들을 고용하게 될 것이라고 주장하지만 이 같은 전망은 ‘넌센스’라 할 수 있다. 미국은 북한 노동자들에게 지급되는 수당이 모두 북한 정권의 계좌로 들어가게 될 것이며, 이들에게는 최소한의 입고 먹을 것만이 지급될 것이라 보고 있다.” 커크 기자는 ‘전시작전통제권’(작통권)을 둘러싸고 견해를 달리하고 있는 한미 군사동맹의 불협화음을 언급했다. 그는 작통권과 관련해 미국은 그동안 한국군이 전시에 미군의 지휘를 받아서는 안 된다는 한국 측의 주장을 거부해왔다며 다음과 같이 말했다. “미국의 입장은 유사시 작통권을 한 명의 장군 휘하에 두고, 현대전의 모든 장비를 구비한 미국이 1950년에 한국을 구원한 것처럼 해야 한다는 것이다. 그러나 이 같은 상황이 또 다시 발생하면 미국은 과연 어떤 행동을 취할 것인가? 주한 미군은 북한 침공로에서 멀리 떨어진 서울 남쪽에 재배치 될 예정이며, 2년 전 3만7천명에 이르렀던 병력을 현재 2만9천500명으로 감축해 2010년에는 2만5천명까지 줄일 계획이다.” 커크 기자는“현재 한미 양국의 이견은 북한 핵 문제, 인권문제, 그리고 통상문제 등 전반에 걸쳐 있다”며 “이 같은 변화는 쉽게 풀 수 있는 문제가 아니다. 향후 어떻게 변할지 예측할 수도, 피할 수도 없다”고 전망했다. (출처: 프리존뉴스) 김필재 기자 spooner1@hanmail.net      미래한국  2006-05-08 오후 12:17:00     ------------------------------------------- 다은은 홍콩의 Asia Times의 기사임 http://www.atimes.com        US, Seoul parting ways over North Korea By Donald Kirk SEOUL -The more US officials claim to be getting along just fine with South Koreans, the more sharply their differences emerge on anything and everything to do with North Korea. The top American diplomat on North Korea, Christopher Hill, talked up US-South Korean rapport so much at a recent luncheon of the American Chamber of Commerce that one might have thought the two allies agreed totally on such hot-button issues as nuclear weapons, counterfeiting and the benefits of the industrial park at Gaesong just across the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea. No way, however, are the United States and South Korea in synch on any of these topics. In fact, the chasm between the two is widening constantly and soon may be unbridgeable. The differences emerge at every twist and turn in the complex, convoluted process of bringing North Korea back to six-party talks in Beijing on giving up its nuclear program. Hill made a huge concession to South Korean sensitivities when he signed off on September 19 to the infamous "statement of principles" under which, sure enough, the North said it would abandon its nukes. The great flaw that renders the statement meaningless except as a document to point to from time to time is that it also promises that all the signatories will review the supply of direly needed energy to the North "at an appropriate time". No sooner was the ink dry on this piece of paper than North Korea reverted to its demand for nuclear power plants, as promised in the 1994 Geneva framework agreement, before doing a thing about halting its program for building nuclear weapons. The fact is, as Hill later acknowledged, he agreed to this document so the United States would not appear as the odd man out, the spoilsport responsible for blocking any agreement at all. He was under strong pressure from the veteran South Korean diplomat who was then the South's chief negotiator at the talks, Song Min-soon. Song, who had gotten to know Hill when they both were ambassadors to Poland, now has moved on - and up - to the highly influential post of national security adviser, one of President Roh Moo-hyun's top aides. At his talk before the chamber Hill let everyone know how friendly he was with Song. He joked that Song had been promoted since the last round of talks while he remained where he was, assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific. The fact they get along so well personally, though, has done nothing to rid South Koreans of the sense that the United States is deliberately sabotaging the talks by raising the issue of North Korean counterfeiting. Why now, Koreans ask, and why won't the United States just drop the topic long enough for North Korea to return to the table? Hill has an easy answer for that one. He said in Washington this week he was just waiting for North Korea to return to its seat at the table, but was not about to engage in the one-on-one talks that North Korea has frequently demanded. North Korea, meanwhile, refuses to attend another round of six-party talks while the US Treasury Department acts to stop counterfeiting, beginning with moves to stifle Macau's Banco Delta Asia from serving as a conduit for North Korea's alleged funny money. If Hill and Song can put on a show of mutual admiration, the same cannot be said for relations between US officials and Lee Jong-seok, the unification minister. Lee, responsible for a wide range of direct dealings between North and South Korea, has no direct American counterpart - a fact that appears to give him wide latitude in criticism that reveals the depth of differences. True, he remarked at a meeting of the National Unification Advisory Council, the United States had shown "no signs" of suddenly shifting its policy from diplomatic efforts to military deterrence - a code word for the dreaded "preemptive strike" that North Korean often accuses the United States of planning. South Korea, he warned, would oppose any such shift. Since the United States, bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan and facing bitter criticism at home for military policies, is in no position to attack North Korea, Lee's harping on this theme reflects an overall leftist effort here at casting the United States in the role of the bad guy in bringing about North-South reconciliation. Seoul - particularly Lee and Roh - disagree most sharply on South Korean economic policies, including aid for North Korea. Washington believes South Korea should demand to know where the food and fertilizer it gives to the North is going and should refuse to give it without guarantees. This issue is not just a rallying cry of American neo-conservatives, accused of exploiting human rights abuses in the North as part of their own agenda. Human Rights Watch, dominated by former Clinton administration people, came out with a report this week that said North Korea had reversed its reformist policies and was again banning the private sale of grain. The grain, Washington advocacy director Tom Malinowski said, was going to the elite, not the millions who needed it most. North Korea, "has gone back to precisely the same set of policies that were a primary cause of that terrible disaster" of the 1990s in which at least 1 million people starved to death, said Malinowski, a former speech writer for former president Bill Clinton's secretary of state, Madeleine Albright. Against this view, Lee said "at least since 2000, when we began providing assistance to the North, no one there has been starving to death". He also had a ready response to US accusations that South Korea has shown no concern for human rights in North Korea, a topic that it avoids publicly by never raising it in North-South talks and abstaining from motions in the United Nations Security Council and General Assembly condemning North Korea for its abuses of its own people. South Korea has accepted more than 8,000 refugees from North Korea while other countries are "attempting to save face" by taking in small numbers, Lee said, a clear reference to the United States, which has just begun accepting a few North Koreans. The worst difference, though, in terms of both economic relations and North Korea may focus on the Gaesong industrial zone. South Korean officials, including Lee, have portrayed the zone as an opportunity for North Korea to reap some of the benefits of capitalism since about 6,000 North Korean workers are toiling away for South Korean companies. They're paid US$57.50 a month, a fortune by North Korean standards, and in a few years the complex will become a regional hub hiring half a million workers for international companies, according to the project's South Korean directors. The Americans frankly regard all this hype as nonsense. They say no workers see the money that's paid into North Korean accounts. They believe they're toiling away for almost nothing, living under terrible conditions, clothed and fed just enough so they'll be able to go on working. These charges, publicized by Jay Lefkowitz, a New York lawyer appointed by President George W Bush as his part-time envoy on human rights in North Korea, not only incense the Unification Ministry but cloud the future of a free trade agreement on which the United States and South Korea begin negotiations in June. The South Koreans want products made in Gaesong included as "made in the Republic of Korea", South Korea. The United States wants them off the table - that is, out of the talks. They're made in North Korea, say the Americans, and we can't consider them, especially since the workers obviously cannot unionize and North Korea refuses to let the United Nations' International Labor Organization and other groups see what the workers are really earning, on what terms and conditions. Such differences as these range far beyond the highly publicized arena of nuclear weapons, fears of a preemptive strike or demands for overhauling the US-South Korean military alliance. The alliance itself, however, clearly fraying, is also at risk. The United States and South Korea differ most publicly on what at this stage is an abstract issue - who should be in charge of South Korean troops in case of war. Ever since the darkest days of the Korean War, the United States has assumed that an American general would be in charge of what are still called "United Nations forces". That's a reference to the anachronistic "United Nations command" that was formed after the North Korean invasion in June 1950 when the Soviet Union boycotted the Security Council session that formally put the UN at war. The United States has repeatedly rejected South Korean insistence that South Korean troops in time of war should not revert to American command. The US view is that only one general can take charge in a war, and the United States, with all the means of modern war at its disposal, would have to rescue South Korea as it did in 1950. But would the United States again ride to the rescue? US forces are pulling back, in a controversial decision, viewed with alarm by some Koreans, to reposition its forces well south of Seoul rather than on the historic invasion route between North Korea and the capital. The United States is also reducing the number of bases while cutting down its forces from 37,000 two years ago to 29,500 today to 25,000 at the end of the decade. Bottom line, both Americans and South Koreans do not expect to have to use any of these troops in another war here. US-South Korean differences focus most sharply on North Korean nukes, human rights and trade issues. But the fear remains that these issues are insoluble - and eventually change, however unpredictable, is inevitable. Journalist Donald Kirk has been in and out of Korea since 1972. (Copyright 2006 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing .) http://www.atimes.com        US, Seoul parting ways over North Korea By Donald Kirk SEOUL -The more US officials claim to be getting along just fine with South Koreans, the more sharply their differences emerge on anything and everything to do with North Korea. The top American diplomat on North Korea, Christopher Hill, talked up US-South Korean rapport so much at a recent luncheon of the American Chamber of Commerce that one might have thought the two allies agreed totally on such hot-button issues as nuclear weapons, counterfeiting and the benefits of the industrial park at Gaesong just across the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea. No way, however, are the United States and South Korea in synch on any of these topics. In fact, the chasm between the two is widening constantly and soon may be unbridgeable. The differences emerge at every twist and turn in the complex, convoluted process of bringing North Korea back to six-party talks in Beijing on giving up its nuclear program. Hill made a huge concession to South Korean sensitivities when he signed off on September 19 to the infamous "statement of principles" under which, sure enough, the North said it would abandon its nukes. The great flaw that renders the statement meaningless except as a document to point to from time to time is that it also promises that all the signatories will review the supply of direly needed energy to the North "at an appropriate time". No sooner was the ink dry on this piece of paper than North Korea reverted to its demand for nuclear power plants, as promised in the 1994 Geneva framework agreement, before doing a thing about halting its program for building nuclear weapons. The fact is, as Hill later acknowledged, he agreed to this document so the United States would not appear as the odd man out, the spoilsport responsible for blocking any agreement at all. He was under strong pressure from the veteran South Korean diplomat who was then the South's chief negotiator at the talks, Song Min-soon. Song, who had gotten to know Hill when they both were ambassadors to Poland, now has moved on - and up - to the highly influential post of national security adviser, one of President Roh Moo-hyun's top aides. At his talk before the chamber Hill let everyone know how friendly he was with Song. He joked that Song had been promoted since the last round of talks while he remained where he was, assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific. The fact they get along so well personally, though, has done nothing to rid South Koreans of the sense that the United States is deliberately sabotaging the talks by raising the issue of North Korean counterfeiting. Why now, Koreans ask, and why won't the United States just drop the topic long enough for North Korea to return to the table? Hill has an easy answer for that one. He said in Washington this week he was just waiting for North Korea to return to its seat at the table, but was not about to engage in the one-on-one talks that North Korea has frequently demanded. North Korea, meanwhile, refuses to attend another round of six-party talks while the US Treasury Department acts to stop counterfeiting, beginning with moves to stifle Macau's Banco Delta Asia from serving as a conduit for North Korea's alleged funny money. If Hill and Song can put on a show of mutual admiration, the same cannot be said for relations between US officials and Lee Jong-seok, the unification minister. Lee, responsible for a wide range of direct dealings between North and South Korea, has no direct American counterpart - a fact that appears to give him wide latitude in criticism that reveals the depth of differences. True, he remarked at a meeting of the National Unification Advisory Council, the United States had shown "no signs" of suddenly shifting its policy from diplomatic efforts to military deterrence - a code word for the dreaded "preemptive strike" that North Korean often accuses the United States of planning. South Korea, he warned, would oppose any such shift. Since the United States, bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan and facing bitter criticism at home for military policies, is in no position to attack North Korea, Lee's harping on this theme reflects an overall leftist effort here at casting the United States in the role of the bad guy in bringing about North-South reconciliation. Seoul - particularly Lee and Roh - disagree most sharply on South Korean economic policies, including aid for North Korea. Washington believes South Korea should demand to know where the food and fertilizer it gives to the North is going and should refuse to give it without guarantees. This issue is not just a rallying cry of American neo-conservatives, accused of exploiting human rights abuses in the North as part of their own agenda. Human Rights Watch, dominated by former Clinton administration people, came out with a report this week that said North Korea had reversed its reformist policies and was again banning the private sale of grain. The grain, Washington advocacy director Tom Malinowski said, was going to the elite, not the millions who needed it most. North Korea, "has gone back to precisely the same set of policies that were a primary cause of that terrible disaster" of the 1990s in which at least 1 million people starved to death, said Malinowski, a former speech writer for former president Bill Clinton's secretary of state, Madeleine Albright. Against this view, Lee said "at least since 2000, when we began providing assistance to the North, no one there has been starving to death". He also had a ready response to US accusations that South Korea has shown no concern for human rights in North Korea, a topic that it avoids publicly by never raising it in North-South talks and abstaining from motions in the United Nations Security Council and General Assembly condemning North Korea for its abuses of its own people. South Korea has accepted more than 8,000 refugees from North Korea while other countries are "attempting to save face" by taking in small numbers, Lee said, a clear reference to the United States, which has just begun accepting a few North Koreans. The worst difference, though, in terms of both economic relations and North Korea may focus on the Gaesong industrial zone. South Korean officials, including Lee, have portrayed the zone as an opportunity for North Korea to reap some of the benefits of capitalism since about 6,000 North Korean workers are toiling away for South Korean companies. They're paid US$57.50 a month, a fortune by North Korean standards, and in a few years the complex will become a regional hub hiring half a million workers for international companies, according to the project's South Korean directors. The Americans frankly regard all this hype as nonsense. They say no workers see the money that's paid into North Korean accounts. They believe they're toiling away for almost nothing, living under terrible conditions, clothed and fed just enough so they'll be able to go on working. These charges, publicized by Jay Lefkowitz, a New York lawyer appointed by President George W Bush as his part-time envoy on human rights in North Korea, not only incense the Unification Ministry but cloud the future of a free trade agreement on which the United States and South Korea begin negotiations in June. The South Koreans want products made in Gaesong included as "made in the Republic of Korea", South Korea. The United States wants them off the table - that is, out of the talks. They're made in North Korea, say the Americans, and we can't consider them, especially since the workers obviously cannot unionize and North Korea refuses to let the United Nations' International Labor Organization and other groups see what the workers are really earning, on what terms and conditions. Such differences as these range far beyond the highly publicized arena of nuclear weapons, fears of a preemptive strike or demands for overhauling the US-South Korean military alliance. The alliance itself, however, clearly fraying, is also at risk. The United States and South Korea differ most publicly on what at this stage is an abstract issue - who should be in charge of South Korean troops in case of war. Ever since the darkest days of the Korean War, the United States has assumed that an American general would be in charge of what are still called "United Nations forces". That's a reference to the anachronistic "United Nations command" that was formed after the North Korean invasion in June 1950 when the Soviet Union boycotted the Security Council session that formally put the UN at war. The United States has repeatedly rejected South Korean insistence that South Korean troops in time of war should not revert to American command. The US view is that only one general can take charge in a war, and the United States, with all the means of modern war at its disposal, would have to rescue South Korea as it did in 1950. But would the United States again ride to the rescue? US forces are pulling back, in a controversial decision, viewed with alarm by some Koreans, to reposition its forces well south of Seoul rather than on the historic invasion route between North Korea and the capital. The United States is also reducing the number of bases while cutting down its forces from 37,000 two years ago to 29,500 today to 25,000 at the end of the decade. Bottom line, both Americans and South Koreans do not expect to have to use any of these troops in another war here. US-South Korean differences focus most sharply on North Korean nukes, human rights and trade issues. But the fear remains that these issues are insoluble - and eventually change, however unpredictable, is inevitable. Journalist Donald Kirk has been in and out of Korea since 1972. (Copyright 2006 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing .)