Address by
H.E.Mr.Gleb A.Ivashentsov,
Ambassador of the Russian Federation, at the 2nd FNF-IFES
International Conference
�Institutionalizing Regionalization
in Northeast Asia
and North Korea�
��� ������������������������������������������������������������������������ (Seoul,
May 29th, 2009)
Dear friends,
����� � I
thank the Institute for Far Eastern Studies of the Kyungnam University and the
Friedrich Naumann Foundation for the invitation to take part in the Roundtable
Session on Peace and Prosperity of Northeast Asia.
����� ��I
appreciate your interest in interaction with Russia in determining the present
and the future of Northeast Asia. That interest is reasonable. Russia has been,
it is and will be an integral part of Northeast Asia. In no other region are internal and
external interests of Russia so interconnected as in Northeast Asia. For the
future of Russia as a great power to much extent depends on the economic,
technological and social uplift of Siberia and the Russian Far East. We believe
that the utilization of the natural and other resources of those vast
territories could deliver results which may be comparable or even greater than
those of the development of the American West a hundred years back. The process
will inevitably exert major influence on all civilization processes in the
Asia-Pacific region and beyond.
������ To develop Asian Russia we need the
absence of external threats. And by our �view such guarantees could be best provided by
developing positive relations with her neighbors. In that we have already
achieved a lot. Our strategic partnership with China has been considerably
enhanced. Russia�s relations with Japan in recent years have been characterized
by an intensive political dialogue at different levels. To the DPRK Russia in linked
with the Treaty of Friendship, Goodneighbourliness and Cooperation.
Russia and the Republic of Korea are
presently jointly working to raise their relationship to the level of strategic
cooperation and partnership. That partnership bears an independent value to my
country in all aspects � be that political, economic or security
considerations. In addition to cooperation on land and sea cooperation in space
has now started. In April 2008 the first Korean cosmonaut Yi Soeyoung trained
in the Russia Star City has made a successful space flight by a Russian
spaceship and in coming months, the Russian-Korean boost rocket KSLV, capable
of taking a payload up to 100 kg to the orbit, will be launched at the Korea
National Space Center at the Oaenaru island in the South Cholla province, which
also being built with Russia�s cooperation.
The Russian-Korean trade volume has
been increasing steadily. In 2008 it approached the mark of USD 20 billion.
This is surely much less than Korean trade with some other countries, but it is
the growth tendency not the nominal figures themselves that counts. We believe
that realisation of joint investment projects particularly in energy, as well
in petrochemical and automobile industries will lead to a much bigger growth in
bilateral trade. There are large scale investments by Korean companies in
Russia in recent years.
All our perspective projects with
the Republic of Korea and other neighbors are however endangered by the war
threat in Northeast Asia. The main source of that threat is the more than
half-century old military confrontation on the Korean Peninsula presently
aggravated by the nuclear issue.
That issue is of a direct concern
for Russia as the DPRK conducted its nuclear tess in an area which is located
at a distance of less than 180 kilometers from our border. We do not like such
a situation. We need neither nuclear nor missile tests at our border. Russia
does not recognize the DPRK as a nuclear power and together with the partners
in the �Six-Party� talks tried its best to convince Pyongyang to give up the
military nuclear program.
The recent nuclear test by the DPRK
cannot be viewed but as an open violation of the Resolution 1718 of the UN
Security Council which inter alia demanded that Pyongyang should abstain from
nuclear tests. I would like to remind that the above resolution was adopted in
accordance with article 41, chapter VII of the UN Charter, and is compulsory
for all UN member-states without exception.��
Russia as a permanent member of the UN Security Council does not intend
and cannot in any form justify any actions detrimental to the authority of the
UN Security Council.
But the North Korean nuclear test
goes contrary not only to the UNSC resolutions but to the Nuclear Nonproliferation
Treaty and Nuclear Test Ban Treaty as well. Russia is one of the founding
fathers of those documents. We think they are extremely important in current
international relations. So anything which would undermine the regimes of those
two treaties is very serious and needs a strong response.
The DPRK�s recent actions provoke
escalation of tension in Northeast Asia and threaten peace and security to the
region. Pyongyang should bear accountability for that. However we think that it
would be counter-productive to undertake steps leading to the de-facto complete
international isolation of the DPRK. In no case the doors for dialogue with
Pyongyang are to be shut. Otherwise the international community would risk to
fully lose any leverage to influence North Koreans that could incite them to
new adventures dangerous not only to regional security but to global WMD
proliferation as well.
We understand that the DPRK might
have certain concerns about its own security, when the factor of force was
getting more and more manifested in the international relations and the
language of ultimatums was widely used. But we do not view a real alternative
to provide her security but along political and diplomatic tracks by forming
relevant regional institutions with the participation of all interested
parties. Therefore we appeal to our counterparts in the DPRK to show a
responsible approach proceeding from the interests of maintenance of stability
in the region and of the WMD non-proliferation regime as well as of respect to
and implementation of the UN Security Council decisions. We continue to hold to
our stand that the nuclear issue of the Korean Peninsula can be settled in the
framework of the Six-Party process only.
With all our condemnation of the
recent missile launches and nuclear tests in the DPRK, I would like to note
that Pyongyang�s actions were not sudden ones. The North Koreans had notified about
such a possibility a number of times well in advance. Those events is the
result of the disruption of the Six-Party talks and it is not only the DPRK
which could be blamed for that disruption.
Therefore if we really want to find
a way out of the present crisis it is very important to cut off emotions. We
are to thoroughly analyze all new nuances and move forward while combining
firmness and determination with restraint and composure.
The recent actions of the DPRK
should not be used by anyone as a pretext for a forceful enlargement of own
military potential, first of all by forming nuclear arsenals, and strengthening
military alliances creating confrontational division lines in Northeast
Asia.����
It is necessary to take all efforts
to resume the Six-Party talks process and to continue the search for an
universally acceptable settlement of the nuclear issue of the Korean Peninsula
on the basis of the already achieved accords and taking into account justified
interests and concerns of all parties. On the other hand all parties to the
talks should�� fully implement all their
obligations in regard to denuclearization as well as in regard to economic
compensations. We should also continue our discussions on the draft guiding
principles of peace and security in Northeast Asia in the frame work of the
relevant working group headed by Russia.
� Economic and energy security is
a major component of global and regional security. Common work on long-term
mutually beneficial joint economic projects in the best way to develop mutual
trust and confidence. We experienced that in the Soviet times in �late 1960-s and early 1970-s, when the first
gas pipe-line was laid from the Soviet Union to Western Europe and the West
European companies took part in construction of a number of industrial plants
in the USSR like the Volga automobile plant by the FIAT company of Italy.
Those economic projects largely
helped to promote detente in Europe which was manifested by the Helsinki
Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in 1975. To take another
example from the European developments one can also recall that the first step
towards the European Union was made by creation of the European Coal and Steel
Community.
I think that some experience of
Europe could be used in Northeast Asia as well. On February 18th the
first natural gas liquefaction plant was put into operation in the South
Sakhalin in the Russian Far East. That plant will deliver to the Republic of
Korea 1.5 Million tons liquefied natural gas annually for a period of 20 years.
The first shipment took place in April. Big deliveries of liquefied gas from
Sakhalin are to go also to Japan and as far as to the Pacific Coast of the
United States. The first phase of the oil pipe-line from Eastern Siberia to the
Pacific Coast of Russia is under completion. It will end at the new oil port
and refinery in the region of Vladivostok. A gas pipe-line will be laid later
parallel to the oil pipe-line directed to the Russian Pacific Coast and to
China.
But Russia is not just an exporter of
gas and oil. More then a third of the ROK needs in fuel for nuclear power
houses are covered by Russian sources. Russia is an important supplier of such
fuel for Japanese nuclear power plants too. New opportunities in that sphere
have opened for my country recently in regard to the USA as well. Russia and
China also actively cooperate in peaceful use of nuclear energy. Will you deny
the opportunities opening here for enhancement mutual understanding through
cooperation in energy?
Dear friends!
The last year was full of important
and sometimes dramatic events in the international affairs. The illusion of the
one-polar world has been irrevocably left in the past. The strengthening of the
regional level of global management is becoming a more influential trend of the
modern world development. We can see that everywhere be it Euro-Atlantic Area
or Europe proper, the post-Soviet space, the Asia-Pacific, Southeast Asia,
Africa or Latin America. Not waiting for the international system disbalanced
about twenty years back to regain its logics and completion, the states are
taking upon themselves initiative and responsibility for developments in their
regions.
Russia welcomes such a trend
whole-heartedly, in relation to Northeast Asia as well. I would add: the issues
of peace and security have become too fateful these days to remain the monopoly
of governments. The broadest political, academic, business circles of all
relevant countries should take part in decision-making. It is on such a ground
only that a more democratic, a more just, and through that � a more secure
international order could be established.
I am confident that the ideas and
suggestions put forward at your conference will be taken up by the interested
governments to serve as basic elements of future international agreements and
will be put to life.
I with you all success in your work!
�