Carter Says Kim Jong-Il Ready To Restart Talks With South Korea, U.S. On Any Issue

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-il is willing to hold talks without preconditions on "any" issue, former President Jimmy Carter said at the end of a trip to Pyongyang to try to defuse tensions on the divided peninsula.

"Chairman and General Secretary Kim Jong-il said he is willing and the people of North Korea are willing to negotiate with South Korea or with the United States or with the six powers on any subject any time and without any preconditions," Carter told a press conference on Thursday.

Carter and three other former state leaders -- known as The Elders -- met the North's leaders in Pyongyang during a "private" visit in which they were also due to discuss the impoverished North's pleas for food aid.

He did not meet with Kim Jong-il in person, but received a note from him.

(Reporting by Jeremy Laurence and Jack Kim; Editing by David Chance)

Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions.

Comments

[ctsturbine]

02:27 AM on 05/05/2011

Carter and team "KooL-Aid" wonder how much this cost the tax payer's. Thank's Jimmy but No. Stick with Habitat for Humanity help the USA before you go over sea. You had your 15 minutes of fame now back off. You can't rewrite history no matter how hard you try.

[johnjfoote]

05:53 PM on 05/04/2011

Carter is an idiot and should be slapped silly for going there . He means well but he is a babe in the woods and has no idea what he is doing,much like his community organizer president.

[elbeas]

10:59 PM on 04/30/2011

As much as I admire Carter's insistence on taking the high road, I believe he's kidding himself. I can't help but think Kim is simply playing for time. Searching for an advantage by flirting with the possibility of talks. He is supposed to be physically incapacitated from the stroke. I can't see him allowing the world to see him in his current frail condition. Wouldn't look good for the Dear Leader to be pushed around in a wheelchair in front of a world audience.

[Dale Andersen]

09:09 PM on 04/30/2011

He wouldn't meet with Mister Carter. He sent him a note instead. What's wrong with this picture?

[Horst]

06:11 AM on 05/01/2011

No one takes Carter seriously anymore. I'm sure that Carter is a very decent person, but chastising South Korea and the US for not increasing food aid to the North Korean dictatorship...in fact calling it a violation of human rights is contemptible.

[TYRANNASAURUS]

10:45 AM on 04/30/2011

Kim Jong-Il Ready To Talk..............

GREAT.............. he should talk to his brutalized and starving population........... tell them why they're starving to death............so short fluffy hair here can watch American movies while he drinks western scotch...... while sitting on a nice soft Italian leather sofa.....I'm sure they'll understand...........they love their DEAR LEADER.

[Edward Standley]

08:32 AM on 04/30/2011

I think it's a good time to agree to talks, but with a few conditions of our own- Greater freedom of travel and greater access to information and communications for the North Korean people. Isolation and starvation have become "normal and accepted" facts of life for the North Koreans. If they are to become a reasonably safe and healthy society that is an asset to the region, they need to know that they have the right to a better life.

[1deepstar]

06:43 AM on 04/30/2011

I appreciate President Carter's work in the diplomacy arena but I have to wonder what is the point in the case of NKorea? They are dangerously aggressive and threatening, bellicose to the extreme. What is the point in talking to them at all? Isolate them and maintain an intolerant attitude about any belligerence on their part.
As we saw in the ME, the power of change lies in the citizenry who rise up on their own behalf and make a change in their country. We don't have to take the regime seriously and we can make the practices of their leaders very difficult by intercepting arms, drugs and counterfeit money and impinging on their foreign accounts and holdings. Every time they threaten something, cut off access to something... The citizens will eat their leaders eventually....

[SouthStJo]

03:15 AM on 04/30/2011

Bet you didnt know North Korea won the world cup

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7TIMpCy8jo&feature=related

[SouthStJo]

03:19 AM on 04/30/2011

10 points to anyone who gets it

[Edward Standley]

01:48 AM on 04/30/2011

Kim Jong Il called? Tell him we're busy. We're washing our hair.

[Mitchell Goth]

07:22 PM on 04/29/2011

Not a few years ago, N. Korea was ready and willing to fire rockets in our direction, and aim to kill. Now they want to talk and negotiate...bipolar much???

[dokjohn]

06:32 PM on 04/29/2011

2 things,
1.Carter routinely criticizes sitting presidents(i think he is the first former president to do so), no class.
2. The measure of a president should be his "leadership" and "effectiveness", not whether he is a nice guy or not.
Clinton: womanizing jerk, bully, but he got stuff done.
Bush II: not an effective leader and didn't have the intellect required for the job.
Indecently, I don't think Clinton was great, I do put a lot of weight on character, but there needs to be balance.
Carter may have been the smartest president but he spent so much energy on the middle-east he left all of us at home hanging.

[Damien Lavizzo]

10:35 PM on 04/29/2011

You say that Carter has no class for criticizing former presidents...in a post where you're criticizing three former presidents.

[dokjohn]

11:35 PM on 04/29/2011

As a former president, a current president could have used his prestige to further American interests around the world... as all presidents have done... it's part of the job.

By him criticizing his successor's, as he has done regularly, and traveling around the world, providing a sympathetic ear to every American hating despot, he has squandered his ability to strengthen America's influence in world affairs.
Also, he has provide a propaganda windfall for our enemies.

His very actions have undermined his own intentions, and he doesn't see it.

My position as a patriotic American, is to criticize and call attention to things I feel are wrong.

[Edward Standley]

01:54 AM on 04/30/2011

I agree with dokjon in that a former President is out of line in publicly criticizing a sitting President. I don't think it's a "free speech" issue, but a national security and foreign policy one. A former President's voice carries disproportional weight compared to that of any other citizen, and should be used very carefully.

[portfolio]

06:05 PM on 04/29/2011

maybe we could give them food , build their economy, make them our friends and trade with them instead of China? It works with south korea.

[Tom43528]

05:14 PM on 05/03/2011

Food aid that the U.S. provided to North Korea in the past was largely diverted to the military. Killing our enemy with kindness won't work in this case.

BTW, did you know that the average North Korean is five inches shorter than the average South Korean? Starvation isn't a new phenomenon in this country, and contrary to Comrade Carter's assertion, it isn't the fault of the U.S.

[Lohikaarme]

02:09 PM on 04/29/2011

Coddling to bloody dictators like Kim Jong-il will never work. On this one Carter is really delusional.

[Yank in France]

02:35 PM on 04/29/2011

What do you propose we do: launch a full-scale attack?

[SouthStJo]

02:47 PM on 04/29/2011

Or just not send them food. You could do that

[hoggirl]

12:20 PM on 04/29/2011

Kim Jong II is apparently insane. Sending food/aid to NK for those that need it is only a good idea IF it actually goes to the needy. Insane dictators are known for using any supplies needed to initiate a further stranglehold on an impoverished, desperate population.

[SouthStJo]

02:42 PM on 04/29/2011

"Sending food/aid to NK for those that need it is only a good idea IF it actually goes to the needy. "

Even then, one has to question the point. I understand the humanitarian impulse, and empathy for starving people. I feel that too, but....realistically does it prolong the real misery?
For one, its not like the problems in North Korea are simply the result of some natural disaster, they are a result of a Orwellian nightmare Kim family theocracy. At what point does it become simply keeping this real life Oceania alive, when it should be imploding?
At the end of the day, our we not feeding our enemy's own army? The Aid is distrubuted to people who are told this is "tribute to the Great D ear Leader" aka Great Man, Who Descended From Heaven and the
Invincible and All-triumphant General (seriously these are actual official titles he holds).

I understand that the biggest fear is that North Korea, if the people every rose up (which is unlikely given the unimaginable level of brainwashing and isolation), it would go out with a bang rather than a wimper, but sometimes you must question if a policy (however "humanitarian") does not do much more harm in the long run to the people you wish to help, than good

[hoggirl]

12:13 AM on 05/01/2011

I agree with you, and didn't really express my opinion well at the time. I don't believe for one minute that the truly needy would receive the aid. It appears that their insane little dictator sees them as less than nothing, existing merely to exalt his noble presence.

The food/aid would no doubt go towards bolstering his troops and the people be damned.

[SouthStJo]

02:55 PM on 04/29/2011

Do drive home that point (and that NK is basically a theocracy), watch this documentary done by NatGeo. They followed a Doctor who travels the world giving eye surgery to blind people in poor countries. In this he comes to the DPRK and performs free surgeries to over a hundred people, giving them back their sight.

Watch their reactions after the bandages come off (from around 3:17):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoHsicn7duU&feature=related

Its one of the saddest things I;ve ever seen

[Bushido08]

12:06 PM on 04/29/2011

Carter please go back to fishing and what you do best and stay away from North Korea. Did you see the keyword here "negotiate". Sorry no more negotiating with North Korea...get rid of the nukes and sign a peace treaty with South Korea or NO MORE TALKS...PERIOD! But it is ironic how North Korea is willing to "negotiate" again after firing several missiles at the South and killing a number of people there...perhaps they figured out that their old time buddy China is now so closely linked at the hip to the US that they are not willing to support this impoverished goofy dictator any longer.

[tksensei]

04:41 AM on 04/30/2011

But they are still supporting him.