‘All options on table’ to deal with North Korea

US PRESIDENT George Bush yesterday said “all options are on the table” for dealing with North Korea, but he expected a nuclear standoff to be resolved diplomatically.

Bush, who was criticised in Congress on Thursday for failing to pay sufficient attention to North Korea as he geared up for possible war with Iraq, said he had spoken with Chinese President Jiang Zemin to seek China’s help in resolving the crisis over North Korea’s resumption of its nuclear program.

“All options are on the table, but I believe we can solve this diplomatically,” Bush told reporters. He was asked about a North Korean warning this week that it might strike the US preemptively, and whether he was prepared to use military force in North Korea.

The United States has said it has no intention of invading North Korea, but on Thursday, a White House spokesman said Washington had “robust plans for any contingencies.”

Bush said he told Jiang that China and the US shared responsibility for keeping the Korean peninsula free of nuclear weapons.

He said he had made the same point in a recent conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and said he had also discussed North Korea with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.

“I talked to the president of China and reminded him that we have a joint responsibility to uphold the goal (of) a nuclear weapons free peninsula,” Bush said.

“We will continue to work diplomatically to make it very clear to (North Korean leader) Kim Jong-il that should he expect any kind of aid and help for his people that he must comply with the world’s demand that he not develop a nuclear weapon,” Bush said.

China’s official Xinhua news agency said that Jiang urged Bush to jointly look for a peaceful solution to the North Korea issue.