Ambassador’s Remarks - Far Eastern Broadcasting Corporation Breakfast, Westin Chosun Hotel

March 4, 2010, 7:05 a.m.

“Transitions”

As Delivered

감사합니다. 안녕하십니까? 김장환 회장님, 오늘은 그냥 빌리라고 불러도 될까요? 빌리김, 김은기 사장님, 장익순 이사장님, 김영규 회장님, 귀빈 여러분. 극동포럼에 초대해 주셔서 아주 큰 영광이라고 생각합니다. 바쁘신 가운데 이렇게 많은 분들이 아침 일찍 와주셔서 감사합니다. 그렇게까지 우리 한미 관계에 대해서 관심이 그렇게 많아서 아주 감동했습니다.

제가 어제 – 좀 있다가 영어로 할게요 – 미국에서 돌아왔습니다. 그래서 일주일 동안 한국말 못했는데, 어제 나리타 공항에서 기다리면서 인터넷 서핑, 검색을 좀 했는데, 아주 놀라운 뉴스를 발견했습니다. 여러분도 보셨는지 모르겠지만은, 미국 대륙을 발견한 사람이 콜롬버스가 아니고 한국인이라고 써있었습니다. 세종대왕 시절에 한국 탐험가가 있었다고 합니다. 현재 캘리포니아 지역을 탐험한 이후에 한국에 돌아와서 세종대왕에게 보고했습니다. 그리고 세종대왕에게 그 새로운 나라 이름을 지어달라고 했습니다. 세종대왕은 한참 동안 고민하다가 “몰라, 아무렇게나 해”라고 대답하셨습니다. 그렇게 해서, 미국의 이름이 ‘아메리카’가 되었습니다.

제가 이 농담을 한 이유는 현재 한미동맹관계에 대해 말씀드리고 싶었기 때문입니다. 60년 동안 양국동맹은 그 역사가 600년이라고 해도 더 강력할 수 없는 상태에 있다고 봅니다.

I am so honored to be here with all of you who have built this great relationship, the 한미관계 over the last decades.   As we begin a new year I am so honored to be here with you, my great friends, and great friends of the U.S.-Korea relationship over these past years.  I want to reflect today with you a little bit on our shared history together, but even more, to look forward, because I believe that the best and most important days of our relationship are still ahead.  And may I say if I did not say it clearly in Korean, you honor me, and you honor my country with your presence today.  It is such a sign of the health of the relationship to see you, many of whom are from what we in the U.S. call the “greatest generation” – those of you and Prime Minister Lho Shin-yong, so many ministers and leaders here – who have built this relationship and are still building it today.          

This year, of course, is an especially important year to reflect on the past because it is the 60th anniversary of a very dark year in Korean history, and also a very important year in the U.S.-Korea relationship.  I was actually talking a little bit about this in Washington.  You know, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan last Friday, and that was one of the meetings I was able to go to while I was in Washington.  As some of you have heard me say before, Secretary Clinton, ever since she became Secretary of State, has emphasized wherever she goes that she sees U.S. foreign policy as based on what in English we say are the three D’s.  I know it does not begin with D in Korean, but the three D’s are:  Defense, Development and Diplomacy.

I have been thinking about this a lot over the last year or so, because when we look at the U.S.-Korea relationship, we have an example of where, because we have worked together in the fields of not only defense, but development and diplomacy, we have succeeded greatly.  Because we continue to work together in those areas, we have so much ahead of us that we can do.

Now, as I have said, maybe our relationship does not go back 600 years, we know it does go back more than 100 years.  I often remind my American audiences of this very significant thing, that when the Kingdom of Korea was struggling with adapting to the challenges of a modern world toward the end of the 19th century, the Kingdom of Korea chose to establish its first relationship with a Western country with the United States.   

Now it was not all smooth sailing after that, but the roots of our relationship are very deep and go back, of course, even before that day 60 years ago when we bonded together in defense of freedom on the Korean peninsula.

I’m not going to tell you – some of you experienced it – about those dark days in the 1950s.  But I do think that we can all work, this year especially, to honor those – including those in this room – who experienced those years and fought for us.        

Invasion.  Retreat.  The loss of Seoul.  General Walker’s “Stand or die” order.  The Pusan Perimeter.  MacArthur’s Incheon landing.  The Chinese cross the Yalu.  Let us all recall that this year, and reflect upon the lessons and the sacrifices. 

Perhaps no one said it better than Donald Maguire of Wisconsin, who drove a bulldozer for the Marine Corps at the landing in Incheon.  I am very glad that in this anniversary year veterans are being interviewed in the U.S. by the local press.  Mr. Maguire said simply, based on his experience so long ago, “I’d hate to see us go back to that war now.  I don’t want to see young people going through what I had to go through.”  That is true for all of us, and this year as we mark the 57th anniversary of the armistice which brought an imperfect end to a terrible conflict, we see the crucial role played by the U.S. and other UN partners in defending the Republic of Korea.

Now in a time of war, stories of tragedy are commonplace.  But out of the devastation of this war, and even with the overarching tragedy of a nation, and a people divided, seeds of hope were planted, seeds of U.S. and Korean cooperation, foretelling the coming history of lasting friendship and partnership between our two nations.  There are hundreds and thousands of stories which tell the tale, and many of you represent them yourselves in your own lives. If I may say, Reverend Kim, Billy Kim, had Sergeant Carl Powers not met a bright, young boy back in 1951, and found a way to send him from here to the United States, maybe we would not be sitting here now.  All of you made a difference.  What happened then still reverberates in our lives and in the partnership of our two countries.

After the war, as we maintained and strengthened our security alliance, we provided a shield, together – and I am so pleased to see so many retired military officers here as well – we provided a defense shield behind which development and diplomacy in the Republic of Korea could flourish and strengthen. 

Now as has already been mentioned, I first came to Korea in 1975, and by that time already the development part of the story was well started.  But, for those of you who are a little bit younger than me in the room, I think it is worth remembering – and I remind Americans of this often – that the Korea I came to in 1975 was a very different place than the Korea of today.  Its per capita GDP had only recently surpassed that of North Korea.  Life was tough.  Life was very tough for people, but at the same time there was a sense of change and hope in the air.  And I could see, in Chungcheonnamdo, in the cities and towns as I travelled around Korea, not only the changes in people’s lives, but also the changes in their hopes for their children and their families.  And that of course is, yes, when I really thought that this is a place that has a very special future.

One of the anecdotes I often tell people outside of Korea when trying to describe the remarkable transformation of this country is that of Park Tae-joon.  During POSCO’s founding days – you probably know this story well – he went to the World Bank to try to get some money to get his steel industry off the ground.  And the loan officer analyzed the income stream, Korea’s macroeconomic data, the available resources, and then, of course, he denied the loan.  He said that this new company called POSCO would never be able to repay the loan, that it did not make any sense for Korea to get into the steel business.  And, of course, fast forward to the present time, and we see that maybe that loan officer was wrong.

But you know, as chance would have it, Chairman Park – he was telling me this story when I met him a while ago – actually met the same World Bank officer a few decades later. 

We don’t have a chance to say, “I told you so” too often, but he met the World Bank officer at a meeting in London and Chairman Park said, “Well, what do you think about that decision now – to deny that loan?”  And you know what the officer said?  He said – the loan officer, the World Bank officer – he said, “Well, I would have made the same decision now.” 

That is what I do not like about bankers.  They are always so sure!

But he said based on the information he had, he made the right decision.  But then he said something else.  He said, “Chairman Park, you did not really tell me then about all the resources at your disposal.  You did not really tell me about your will, and about the will, and the drive of the Korean people.”  That was what really made that enterprise possible, and indeed, the economic transformation.

This economic relationship, sometimes what I call Korea’s first great transformation of the 20th Century, was something that did get some assistance from the U.S. and others.  Maybe not in the case of that loan from the World Bank, but there were other things I am pleased to say I think the U.S. did right . . . and that was to have an assistance program that tried to support the drive for education and the talents of the Korean people. 

And now, what do we have many years later?  Well, first of all, the U.S.-Korea relationship – the economic relationship – is one of the world's most important, with two-way trade in goods and services exceeding $100 billion in 2009, a significant figure in a time of economic downturn.  We anticipate this year continued growth in our trade levels.   

I know Koreans – if you don’t mind me saying so – are often focused on, “Are we the 13th largest economy, or the 12th, or the 14th?” and sometimes this depends on exchange rates.  I would submit to you, with all due respect, if I may, that maybe that is the wrong statistic. 

I tell Korean audiences – and you all know this – I tell Korean audiences, look at the list of things that Korea does:  The world’s largest ship builder today; the home of the world’s second and third largest producers of cell phone handsets; the home to the largest and the second largest TV manufacturers in the world. 

And in all these areas there is a synergy between Korean and American business that sometimes is not so obvious when you just pick up that cell phone, or when you just turn on that TV.  For example, Samsung Electronics and the American company, Corning, have a very successful joint venture in Korea that produces LCD glass for TV screens.  Less than two weeks ago, Kia formally launched a new automotive factory in the United States.  About three weeks ago I visited the GM-Daewoo plant in Gunsan.  And I also visited in Gunsan a plant that is using American technology to build wind turbines, which will go around the world.  I could give you many examples, but we are knit up in so many ways. 

And so, it is no surprise, just given the economic relationship alone, that Korea and the United States agreed in 2007 to the Korea - U.S. Free Trade Agreement.  There is still work to be done.  I met a number of people in Washington this past week to talk about that, including the U.S. Trade Representative, Ambassador Ron Kirk, as well as our Agricultural Secretary, Tom Vilsack.  I am not name-dropping with you just to name-drop, but I am telling you when I go to Washington people are interested in hearing about this relationship because it is so important and we know we have work to do, especially on the Free Trade Agreement. 

In fact last week President Obama commented again on this Free Trade Agreement, and on the need to find a way forward.  It still awaits ratification in both the U.S. Congress and the Korean National Assembly.  While I think you will be not surprised that I am not going to get into detail or make any commitments regarding timing here today, I do want to emphasize to you that from President Obama on down, the United States is committed and we have a solid basis for moving forward.  We are continuing to consult closely with Congress and our stakeholders as we develop proposals to share with Korea to address the remaining concerns on the Free Trade Agreement. 

But if you remember my narrative – going back for a minute – of defense, and development, and diplomacy, I want to move to another part of diplomacy, in Korea’s development, and that is what I call – in personal terms I guess – Korea’s second great transformation.  And that was its democratic transformation in the 1980s.  I stand here with all humility before you, because you are the people, many of you, who experienced this transformation and made this happen; and may I say, I think that the role of the churches was especially important during this time as well.  

I returned to Korea as a young diplomat in 1983 and it was an extraordinary time – there might be some other words for it too, back then – I call it now the flowering of democracy.  It didn’t always look like flowers back then, and former Prime Minister Lho Shin-yong knows that very well – sometimes the streets were a haze of tear gas; human rights were a serious issue on the U.S.-ROK bilateral agenda – but again, over the course of a remarkably short period of time Koreans took the future into their own hands and shaped it in a way to build a lasting democracy. 
 
In thinking of those times, I do think of the many, many friends and contacts I developed throughout Korean society, including in the churches.  And I remember too, Cardinal Kim Sou-hwan, who passed away this past year.  As an American diplomat in Korea in the 1980s, I had the chance to call on Cardinal Kim a number of times, particularly between 1984 and 1987.  And he, like so many in Korea, was always so generous in meeting with visitors from the United States, including Congressmen and U.S. officials who were concerned about human rights or wanted to understand the political and social realities better.  I also used to see him from a distance when Myeongdong Cathedral became a focal point for confrontation at times between protesters and police, and also served as a place of reflection and dialogue during some difficult times. 
 
But I remember one particular meeting with Cardinal Kim.  It was in October 1985 and I was accompanying our departing Deputy Chief of Mission as he paid a farewell call on the Cardinal.  This was a courtesy call, but I will never forget that Cardinal Kim had something very serious to say.  He said after much reflection that he’d concluded that the government authorities were wrong to think they could deal with rising unrest among Koreans, particularly the young, only through police power.  He said he was convinced the only answer was for the regime to take the courageous step of amending the constitution to allow for democratization, and that ninety percent – he said ninety percent – of Koreans felt that way.
 
Now looking back from the vantage point of 2010, that probably seems very obvious.  But I know many of you lived through those years too, and I think that maybe you can reflect with me on how important they were then; because it did take, even after 1985, almost another two difficult years – years filled with debate, demonstrations, confrontation, and lots of tear gas – before the June 1987 decision to hold a direct election of Korea’s next president.  This was a watershed year for Korea in its democratic journey.  But I would say that the tipping point, and those of you who have seen that book called the “Tipping Point,” actually came much earlier. It was those Koreans, many of them who were involved in the churches, in civil society, that Cardinal Kim was seeing and was pointing to in his remarks that day in October 1985. 

Mohandas Gandhi said, “In a gentle way, you can shake the world.”  Well sometimes it was not always gentle here, but there were people, and many of them in this room today, who were shaking that world in that gentle way, and I pay tribute to all of you. 

And now more than 20 years later, where are we?  Well, I am such a fan of Korean democracy and I tell people – and I know we have some politicians here today as well – the best thing about Korean democracy is I think people complain about your democracy almost as much as we complain in the United States about our democracy.  Candidates from across the political spectrum have held the top office, and, throughout all that, economic growth has continued, and the U.S.-Korea relationship has continued to develop.  Yes there are bumps, but it has continued to prosper and mature.  Last year, we mourned the loss of former President Kim Dae Jung, who fought for democracy in Korea and won the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in North Korea, and who led Korea through the financial crisis in the late ‘90s.  I was so moved last year to see former President Kim Dae Jung’s former enemies as well as his supporters gather to pay tribute to his contributions to building today’s Republic of Korea.  What a great sign of the maturity of Korea’s democracy. 

And so with that background, that great economic transformation coupled with a democratic transformation in Korea, I believe that Korea itself and the U.S.-Korean relationship – on the basis of our work together in defense, diplomacy, and development – are on the threshold of yet another transformation, a transition beyond a basic security alliance, beyond even an economic partnership, to something really very different and special. 
 
What do I mean by that?  Well, we have got to have breakfast here sometime, so I am not going to go into all the details, but last June when our two Presidents met – President Obama, President Barack Obama hosted President Lee Myung-bak in Washington, D.C. – they issued a Joint Statement.  It was not just a statement, it was a Vision Statement.  Now a lot of people outside of government think that vision and government statements do not go together, but this is a visionary statement, and I know that most of you have read it.  The Joint Vision Statement spells out just what our nations aspire towards:  “Ensuring a peaceful, secure and prosperous future for the Korean Peninsula, the Asia-Pacific Region, and the world.”  The Joint Statement talks about the steps we are going to take to bring our relationship and our work together to the next level. 

Now as we take it to the next level, we are very mindful that we have important, unfinished tasks before us on the Korean Peninsula.  The division of Korea and the terrible war here were among the great tragedies of the 20th Century.  And now that we are well into the 21st Century, I believe that more than ever, we need to – as we did in post-Cold War Europe – find a way to hasten the day when Korea will be whole, free, and at peace. 

We want to see peaceful unification consistent with the desires of the Korean people; and of course, we want to see a denuclearized Korean Peninsula.  That means no nuclear weapons in North Korea as indeed there are no nuclear weapons in South Korea.  And it means better opportunities and human rights for the long-suffering people of the northern part of this peninsula who we all know, with great pain in our hearts, have the same aspirations and wishes as the people of South Korea, and indeed of the world, for opportunities for their children and their futures in this 21st Century.  

But, given Pyongyang’s continued refusal to recognize that North Korea has been on the wrong course, the question for the United States and the rest of the international community for the last year or so is:  Where do we go from here, and what do we do about it?

I think that our response as an international community and as allies has been unequivocal and unanimous.  We have made clear that the United States and our allies and partners cannot accept a North Korea that seeks to maintain nuclear weapons and programs, launch ballistic missiles or engage in weapons proliferation of any kind.  And we remain committed, along with our partners, the other five parties in the Six-Party process, to the goal we laid out in September 2005:  The verifiable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner. 

Now for the sake of time I will not go into the very active diplomacy in which we continue to engage.  Most of you know that our special envoy, a good friend of many of you in this room, Ambassador Stephen Bosworth, was here last week, as well as in Beijing and Tokyo.  Secretary Clinton had the opportunity to talk with Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan about the same issue last week. 

I think we are working as closely together as we ever have on this big challenge. The level of trust and understanding of our interests here and the need to work together are stronger than they ever have been.  We will continue to work together to make clear that North Korea needs to return to the denuclearization talks and to fulfill its commitments.  That path remains open, and it is up to North Korea to take it.

That, in turn, would lead the United States and our partners to reciprocate in a comprehensive and coordinated way, including normalization of relations, a permanent peace regime. All this can be negotiated – in close consultation and coordination with the Republic of Korea – along with significant energy and economic assistance.  All of these are possible in the context of full and verifiable denuclearization.  

I want to spend my last few minutes talking about the other dimension of our 21st Century joint vision, and that is taking our partnership to a new level in working on those global issues that increasingly our diplomacy is focused on – whether it is climate change, or food security, or the financial crisis.  From our work together in Iraq in previous years, to our current and future work together in Afghanistan; from our work together in the Gulf of Aden, to our work together in Haiti. 

I have been so moved, not only by the response by the government of the Republic of Korea to the disaster in Haiti, but even more so by the outpouring of concern and support from the churches, individuals, companies and groups throughout Korea.  I cannot tell you how many people have come up to me to express their concern about Haiti and to talk to me about what to do about it.  This is quite impressive, but it is natural as Korea increasingly takes its rightful place on the world stage.  

As Korea prepares to host the G-20 Summit in Seoul in November, our two governments are working closely together to ensure that Korea's chairmanship and Summit are productive and substantive.  Korea is now steering the vital coordination underway to ensure a successful transition from global economic crisis to recovery.  The Seoul Summit promises to be a momentous event.  I know it will be a great event for Korea.  It is an important event for all of our countries, and for our partnership.  

Another shared goal in the global arena that Korea and the United States can promote together is economic development – going back to the three D’s.  Not long ago, Korea was a recipient of development assistance.  That assistance program ended in Korea at the beginning of the 1980s and now Korea is a donor in its own right.  I am always so pleased when President Lee Myung-bak mentions this because as a former Peace Corps volunteer here, I tell all of my American friends – and I actually saw the Peace Corps Director, the new Director, in Washington when I was there last week, as well as our USAID leaders – that Korea remains the only country in the world to have received Peace Corps volunteers to now be sending them abroad.  I know that there are young Koreans, and also not-so-young Koreans, going abroad in many capacities – whether it is through the World Friends program, the KOICA programs, through church and civic groups – because of this sense of global responsibility and it is a wonderful thing to see.  

One of things that I used to hear when I lived in Korea many years ago, which sounds so anachronistic now, was, “We Koreans are like frogs in a well,” 우물안 개구리.  No one ever says that now; they look at me like I’m crazy when I say it because you aren’t anymore.  The frog is out there on the world stage. 

And there is a lot to do.  During his visit to Korea, President Obama also highlighted Korea's efforts to promote clean energy and combat climate change.  We share a similar approach.  We need to work together, and we are.

Both our countries support the global growth of the peaceful use of nuclear energy.  We congratulate Korea for its recent success in exporting nuclear reactors.  We will continue our cooperation to guarantee the safety and proliferation-resistance of nuclear energy.

Underpinning all of this is again something I think many of you in this room really personify.  What has made this extraordinary relationship and the growth in it possible?  Yes, it has been common interests and common values.  Yes, it has been Korea’s remarkable economic transformation and its remarkable democratization.  But underpinning all of that is something else, and that is our people-to-people ties.  Let’s reflect on how much that has changed.  When I first came here in 1975, I knew no one in Yesan – or for that matter anyone I met in the towns and villages of Chungnam – who had been to the United States.  Most of the people who saw me, I was the first foreigner they ever saw, and they usually had something to say about it, too!

In those days, as many of you know, it was very hard to get a passport or even foreign currency.  So there was not a lot of people-to-people contact.  Billy was a pioneer in that in many ways. 

But now what do we have?  I won’t ask everyone to raise a hand if you have a family member studying or working in the United States, but I would guess that 60 to 70 percent would be a conservative guess of how many people would raise their hands here.  We have somewhere between 1.5 and 2.5 million Koreans, Korean-Americans living in the United States, adding to our own cultural and economic strength. 

Our Visa Waiver Program, which went into effect at the end of 2008 is great for our economy, as is the fact that even during a year of economic downturn and a weakness in the won-dollar exchange rate, more than 600,000 Korean visitors went to the United States last year.

We are all the time expanding, as I know many of you are, exchange programs both to bring Americans here and to send more Koreans to the United States.  Many of you have heard that one of the things that so deeply impressed President Obama – and he was really very deeply impressed by what he saw in Korea when he visited last November – was what impresses every foreigner in Korea, the zeal for education.  The 교육열.  He has talked a few times about what he heard from President Lee Myung-bak about that.  I know I hear from Koreans sometimes, every time President Obama praises the Korean educational system everyone here shudders a little bit and says, “Well we have so many problems.”  But you have passion, and that is what President Obama felt and that is what he so admired.  We need more of that, too.  

We do get some of it from you.  Koreans are investing their most valuable resource, their children, in the United States, for education at all levels – more than any other country.  How extraordinary.  You know there are a lot of Chinese students and a lot of Indian students, but ROK students are the most numerous when you include all levels of education.  What a compliment to our educational system.  What a vote of confidence in the future of the U.S.-Korea relationship.

So, as we look for lessons as we go forward, we can learn a lot from our engagement over the last sixty years where we have brought the tools of defense, development, and diplomacy to bear, and where we have been joined by extraordinary partners in the Korean people.  And I hope that we all can agree that the United States and Republic of Korea, now more than ever, are stronger together than they could ever hope to be alone.  We must work together. 

You know when President Obama was here last November, he said this: “The relationship between our two countries is excellent and stands stronger than ever.” 오바마 대통령도 지난 11월 한국을 방문하셨을 때 이렇게 말씀하셨습니다. 한미 관계는 그 어느 때보다 강하다고 그렇게 말씀하셨어요.  I do not think that is an exaggeration.  We have a lot of challenges in front of us, but I think that our relationship, thanks to the work that many in this room have done over the years and are doing now, is broader and deeper than ever, and more resilient than ever. 

Now some of you know I like to learn Korean proverbs.  There is one more Korean proverb that I want to leave you with, and it is this one: 백지장도 맞들면 낫다, 맞아요?  “Even a sheet of paper is lighter if two people lift it.”  I think the same is true for countries, and I believe the United States and Korea lifting each other even higher in the months and years to come will be essential for both our countries.   

And so again, I am so honored to be here today and I am so impressed – I will have to tell Washington that at seven o’clock in the morning in March we have an overflow audience of the most distinguished people in the country to talk about 한미관계.  You can see I am still struggling with my Korean, and I was very nervous when I first came to Korea because I was told that you have to be really careful about what you say, you know, especially about 한미관계.  Is it a 우호관계?  Is it 동맹관계?  Is it partnership 관계, what else, 동맹관계, 혈맹관계 – I remember that from many years ago.  Many wonderful words, but sometimes people also say it is a 복잡한 관계!

But, you know, it is all those things.  It is all those things.  What I have concluded from my 35 years now in which I have been privileged to witness the extraordinary development of this country, to be a participant in the extraordinary growth of our relationship, I have concluded that it’s a very, very special relationship.  So I just call it 우리관계.  So for 우리관계, I thank you all for all you do.  I thank you for your attention this morning and I look forward to working with you this year and beyond. 

Thank you very much.  
 

Question and Answer Session:

QUESTION: Good morning Ambassador.   Well, as usual your talk today was very enjoyable, impressive, and I feel greatly honored with all the compliments you made to describe the progress of Korea’s democracy and the development of Korea’s economy.  You said you liked it when you were called not only as the U.S. Ambassador, but 우리 대사님.  I like it so much. 

You mentioned about the security issue, our common issue of resolving the North Korean nuclear problem.  I have some concern.  President Obama’s recent meeting with Dalai Lama, as well as U.S. arms sales to Taiwan, is adding up to the subtle tension between the United States and China.  The increasing tension between the two countries however, may have adverse impacts on resolving the North Korean nuclear problem.  For the free countries: the United States, South Korea to take a concerted effort in dealing with North Korea.  What do you think of direct, or indirect effects of the subtle and increasing tension between the United States and China on the U.S., China, Korea tripartite collaboration in dealing with North Korea. Thank you.

Ambassador Stephens: Well thank you Ambassador Yim, and thank you for all that you do and that the Korea Foundation does to support Korea’s global emergence.

I agree with you. Our work with China is extremely important.  China’s role in the Six Party Talks, China’s role in encouraging, pressuring, clearing the path for North Korea to return to negotiations on denuclearization is critical. I think we are working together pretty well.  Now, the U.S.-China relationship is a big, complicated relationship.  The China-ROK relationship is also a big relationship and ever more important, and I am glad to see that it is strengthening and deepening.

The U.S., speaking for our own relationship with China, is committed to building a positive, comprehensive, cooperative relationship with China.  Some of the issues you mention in the U.S.-China relationship are not new issues, and they are ones that we want to handle in a positive, cooperative way.  That is why our Deputy Secretary of State, Mr. Jim Steinberg, is in Beijing today to meet with his Chinese counterparts, and to keep building that relationship. 
Now in terms of our joint efforts in dealing with North Korea, I think China, as we saw when Steve Bosworth was in Beijing – along with your special representative, Wi Sung-lac, just about a week ago – I think that China understands the importance of working closely with both of us.  So bottom line is, yes we have a complicated bilateral relationship with many issues.  Our work together with North Korea is just too important.  We will not be distracted and I am confident that the Chinese continue to understand the importance of working closely with us, and with the Republic of Korea.