US must de-escalate tensions with North Korea: Analyst
The United States must de-escalate tensions with North Korea and negotiate a deal to bring stability to the Korean Peninsula, an American writer and retired professor says.
“The North Koreans have come up with a proposition to negotiate with the United States on lessening military exercises in exchange for the North Koreans lessening their missile program,” said James Petras, a professor emeritus of sociology at Binghamton University in New York, and adjunct professor at Saint Mary's University in Halifax, Canada.
“This is a very positive initiative from North Korea and should be taken serious by the United States,” Petras told Press TV on Tuesday.
“Instead of escalating, I think they should de-escalate and negotiate and come to some mutual agreement and this is not on [President Barack] Obama’s agenda unfortunately,” he added.
Obama has said the United States is positioning missile systems and establishing a “shield” to counter threats from North Korea.
“One of the things that we have been doing is spending a lot more time positioning our missile development systems, so that even as we try to resolve the underlying problem of nuclear development inside of North Korea,” Obama said in an interview with CBS News which aired on Tuesday.
“We’re also setting up a shield that can at least block the relatively low-level threats that they're posing now,” he added.
Pyongyang announced Sunday that it test-fired a ballistic missile from a submarine as a response to ongoing military drills by South Korea and the US.
A day before the test, the North Korean foreign minister proposed that the country was ready to halt its nuclear tests if the United States abandons its military exercises in the region.
Obama dismissed the offer Sunday and said North Korea would “have to do better than that.”
Petras said the Obama administration is not taking the right stand with Pyongyang especially in light of its most recent offer. “It will only hasten and accentuate North Korea’s fears and its missile program.”
In March, the US and South Korea began massive war games involving more than 17,000 American and 300,000 South Korean troops, with warships and aircraft carrying out live-fire drills in the region.
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