North Korea releases abductees' kin

BEIJING — Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi finished a one-day trip to North Korea on Saturday with a modest diplomatic victory, arranging to bring home five family members of Japanese citizens who had been kidnapped by the North Korean regime years ago.

The five North Korean-born children of the abductees were flown to Japan almost immediately, but left behind were Charles Jenkins, the American husband of another former abductee, and their two children. Jenkins is an alleged army deserter who would face charges if he landed in Japan.

In exchange for the family members, Japan agreed to provide North Korea 250,000 tons of food aid and $10 million worth of medical supplies and other humanitarian aid.

The scenario of Japan's leader negotiating for the release of the children of its kidnapped citizens represented the latest diplomatic effort to coax and coerce the belligerent, paranoid regime of Kim Jong Il to engage the outside world.

North Korea, which is desperately poor while maintaining a powerful military, continues to hold the world at bay with its nuclear weapons programs. Koizumi said he tried to explain to Kim during their 90-minute meeting that his regime would be better off if he broke his pattern of brinkmanship and tried cooperation.

Koizumi said North Korea pledged to continue a moratorium on missile tests, but there was no breakthrough in persuading Kim to abandon his nuclear ambitions.

"I emphasized strongly to Kim Jong Il that there is very little to gain in terms of energy aid or food aid by possessing nuclear weapons," Koizumi told reporters in Pyongyang. "But if you abandon nuclear weapons, you can gain the international community's cooperation."

Japan is working closely with the United States, China, South Korea and Russia to pressure North Korea to dismantle its nuclear programs in exchange for aid and other incentives. The abduction issue represented one of the biggest stumbling blocks to Japan's efforts to offer North Korea diplomatic recognition, but Tokyo has made clear it will hold back on those negotiations unless there is progress on the nuclear issue.

A United Nations envoy on Saturday arrived in Beijing from North Korea and said North Korea intends to push ahead with nuclear weapons development until it gets a reliable guarantee that the United States won't attack.

"They look at their nuclear weapons as the best guarantee they have against a threat that they perceive from the United States," Maurice Strong told reporters at the Beijing airport. "They are going to continue, they say, to develop that capability until there is a security guarantee that they can rely on."