NKorea must stop nuke testing before any talks

In South Korea on Monday, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov warned that the situation on the Korean Peninsula could become “apocalyptic” but added that he had one key reason to be hopeful: North Korea had not tested any weapons in more than two months.

“We greatly value that North Korea preserves the regime of silence for two months already, and Russia actively works to make sure that the current regime continues as long as possible,” Morgulov said at the opening of the annual Valdai Club Asian Regional Conference in Seoul, according to  The Valdai Discussion Club is a think tank based in Russia.

Moreover, Morgulov pointed toward this lull in activity as a positive sign for a “freeze for freeze” agreement with Pyongyang — a de-escalation plan favored by Russia and China. It calls for North Korea to freeze its missile and nuclear tests in return for the United States and South Korea suspending their annual joint military exercises.

“If Pyongyang’s demonstrated restraint over the past two months was met with similar reciprocal steps on behalf of the United States and its allies, then we could have moved to the start of direct talks between the United States and North Korea,” Morgulov said

His statement reflects a rare burst of optimism in the ongoing standoff over North Korea's weapons program. Unfortunately, there's a worrying hole in the logic: North Korea's break in weapons testing may be seasonal, rather than strategic

Pyongyang's last recorded weapons test occurred 73 days ago, on Sept. 15. That launch, in which a missile was fired over Japan, capped a bout of activity that had heralded a number of technological developments in North Korea's weapons program, including the test of its most 

These tests were more noteworthy for their advancements than their frequency. Data compiled by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies’ North Korea Missile Test Database shows that Pyongyang has conducted 19 missile tests in 2017. The number is large but still lags behind the number of tests last year, when 24 missiles were tested

Source: AFP