Clinton urges N. Korea not to test missile

TOKYO - Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton talked tough on her first overseas trip as America's top diplomat, delivering a sharp warning to North Korea yesterday over its threat to conduct a missile test.

As she wound down a day of events in Tokyo and prepared for the next stop on her Asian tour, Indonesia, Clinton said North Korea's threatened missile test would harm its prospects for improved relations with the United States and its neighbors.

She said if Pyongyang wanted to end its isolation, it would have to act on pledges made to Bush administration negotiators to scale back its nuclear-weapons efforts.

"The decision as to whether North Korea will cooperate in the six-party talks, end provocative language and actions is up to them, and we are watching very closely," Clinton said, referring to North Korea's talks with the United States and four other nations over efforts to nudge the North to abandon nuclear weapons.

Japan, too, is concerned about North Korean intentions. Its diplomats, along with envoys from the United States, China, Russia and South Korea, have been involved in the six-nation talks, which are to resume this week in Moscow.

"If North Korea abides by the obligations it has already entered into and verifiably and completely eliminates its nuclear program, then there will be a reciprocal response certainly from the United States," Clinton said.

The U.S. response would include a chance to normalize relations with the United States, formally ending the 1950-53 Korean War with a peace treaty to replace the current armistice, as well as energy, financial, and humanitarian assistance, she said.

But on Monday, three days after Clinton floated the incentives, North Korea used the 67th birthday of its leader, Kim Jong Il, to say it has the right to "space development" - a term it has used to disguise a long-range missile test as a satellite launch.

Then yesterday, after Clinton's warning, North Korea repeated accusations that Washington intended to attack it and warned the United States of "destruction" if it did so. Successive U.S. administrations have said they have no intention of attacking the North.

At a news conference with Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone, Clinton also stressed the Obama administration's commitment to Japan's security.

The two signed a deal to reduce tensions caused by the presence of U.S. troops on Japanese soil. Under the deal - which has been in the works for years - 8,000 Marines now stationed on the Japanese island of Okinawa will be moved to the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam. There are roughly 50,000 American troops in Japan, about 20,000 on Okinawa.

Clinton also vowed to keep up pressure on the North to resolve Japan's concerns about the status of Japanese citizens abducted by Pyongyang in the 1970s and '80s. She met with relatives of some abductees in a private session at the U.S. Embassy.

To underscore U.S.-Japan ties, Clinton invited Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso to Washington next week.

Aso will be the first foreign leader to visit President Obama at the White House.

Japan's finance minister resigned in disgrace yesterday after slurring his speech and

nodding off during the G-7 summit in Rome last weekend.

Shoichi Nakagawa denied he was drunk and blamed his behavior

at a news conference

in Italy on cold

medicine and jet lag, but even friends weren't buying this.

It was the latest blow

to the beleaguered government of Prime Minister Taro Aso, whose support fell into the single digits in a recent poll, increasing speculation his days

are numbered.

Opposition lawmakers lodged a censure motion against Nakagawa after he returned to Tokyo and had demanded he quit. "He embarrassed himself in front of the world," said opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa.

Fellow cabinet member Seiko Noda called the incident "shocking."

"I decided that it would be better for the

country if I quit," said Nakagawa, one of Aso's closest political allies.

- Associated Press

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