Former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, arrived in the North Korean capital Pyongyang Wednesday amid hopes of a breakthrough in relations between the United States and the two Koreas, symbolized by the person who welcomed them at the airport.
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North Korea's nuclear envoy Kim Kye-gwan, a veteran of years of off and on talks with U.S. envoy on North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons program, and welcomed the couple's first prior to their arrival at the start of a visit to the overnight that the United States insists it is strictly private " "human". "
Although the stated reason for the visit is to make the United States, a local citizen Ayalon Gomez home, which seems to be diplomatic cover for talks now expected to be Mr. Carter with senior North Korean officials, and possibly with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. Mr. Gómez, of Boston, in South Korea as a teacher and preacher until he was arrested in January after crossing the border from China with a letter asking the Kim Jong Il to resign. Said North Korean media that he tried to commit suicide after being sentenced by a court in April sentenced to eight years in prison.
Story: Is it possible to replicate the success of Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton in North Korea?
Carter agreed to go, apparently with the consent of the White House, after the North Korean authorities clear that it will not be released unless Gomez A high-level Pyongyang, the U.S. came to bring him back. Said Pyongyang Korean Central News Agency in only a short cable that "Carter's group," whose members did not disclose them, which had arrived, Kim Kye-gwan was greeted them.
The man who was sent to receive the signal Carter
"Meeting Kim Kye-gwan in Carter has a symbolic meaning," says Kim Sung-han, a professor at Korea University here. "It symbolizes the North Korea plans to shift attention to the issue of nuclear disarmament" - and away from the sinking of the South Korean Navy, and Cheonan, in March. North Korea denied repeatedly and had no connection with the shooting of blow that the division of the ship in two in the Yellow Sea with the loss of 46 people.
"Nuclear disarmament is a priority for North Korea," says Mr. Kim, in reference to statements by expressing the readiness of North Korea to return to the six-party talks it has avoided since December December 2008. North Korea last week and received China's nuclear envoy, Wu Dawei, to Pyongyang, and Mr. Wu arrives in Seoul for talks on Thursday and which will pass without a doubt the position of North Korea.
At the same time, Carter is expected to return to Washington with a message aimed at fostering dialogue beyond the recriminations over the sinking of Cheonan, an incident that has raised tensions on the Korean peninsula to its highest level in years.
Escalated and defense minister in South Korea, Kim Tae Young, the rhetoric on Tuesday, saying that South Korean troops would fire on the objectives of the North Korean fired in artillery shells from North Korea landed on the South Korean side of the line in the Yellow Sea, as they did after South Korea the end of training there is more than a week. South Korean and U.S. Navy ships are planning more war games next month in the Yellow Sea in early.
"Maybe we need a cooling-off period," says Kim Sung-Han. "We will be exploring an exit strategy" - that is, break the cycle of threats and counterthreats. At the same time, he adds, "North Korea needs to show a sign of a change in behavior, a plan or road map."
Carter was here before
About the Carter suggests how North Korea is very likely to consider him as an envoy.
And Mrs. Carter visited Pyongyang in June 1994, he held historic talks with his father, Kim Jong Il, in the long run, the ruling "Great Leader" Kim Il Sung, in a boat on the Daedong River. Despite the fact that Mr. Kim died less than four weeks later, to defuse the growing crisis meeting of nuclear and led to the signing of an agreement in Geneva in October 1994 under which North Korea to shut reactor in return for a promise to build twin light-water reactors, nuclear energy.
The media in South Korea on Wednesday evening full of speculation that Kim Jong-il will see Carter, just as he saw another former Democratic president, Bill Clinton, in early August of last year. Directed Mr. Clinton, like Carter to Pyongyang aboard a private jet, in his case to pick up two women from the network of Al Gore who have Internet TV by North Korean forces captured the shooting on the border with China along the Tumen River.
"Are the tensions between the United States and North Korea visit with ease," and asked the Chosun Ilbo, the largest paper in South Korea. "Carter's visit and perhaps more important" than Clinton, the newspaper said, in spite of the Geneva agreement failed to prevent North Korea to halt its nuclear program and was never to build power reactors.
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