Grim's Hall

State Dept. Whistles Past Graveyard:

The Kansas City Star has a report from the talks on the DPRK's weapons program, entitled "US Optimistic on North Korea Talks." An excerpt:

The State Department said Tuesday a strong consensus emerged at last week's six-nation meeting in China that North Korea should end its nuclear weapons program and that more multilateral talks were needed to bring about that goal.

Spokesman Richard Boucher said Secretary of State Colin Powell was not surprised by a "belligerent" North Korean attitude at the discussions.

Now, I suppose if you're a diplomat, it's bad form to say after the first day of talks that there is no hope and the talks have failed. Couldn't we, though, at least restrain ourselves to "cautious optimism," given the DPRK's response?

North Korea has said it has no choice but to increase its nuclear deterrent following multilateral talks in Beijing.

The statement, made by a North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman, also said Pyongyang is not interested in holding any more talks on the future of its controversial nuclear programme.