. Pyongyang argues that the nuclear issue can be resolved only through direct meetings between the DPRK and the United States. The U.S. position is that Pyongyang must comply with the IAEA special inspection because of the obligations it assumed under the nuclear nonproliferation treaty (NPT). A second issue involves the U.S. military presence in the South. The communist North wants U.S. troops out of the South, its argument being that the cold war is over and that the U.S. military presence is the primary source of threat to the North. However, given the triangular nature of ties among Washington, Seoul, and Pyongyang, the North's policy toward Washington is bound to affect its policy toward Seoul. This means that unless Pyongyang's resolve to coexist with Seoul becomes credible, its demand for U.S. withdrawal could be misconstrued in Seoul as a continuing attempt to undermine South Korea. In the short run, it can be argued that the U.S. presence can be in Pyongyang's own interest as the presence could become a potentially stabilizing force as the two Koreas strive for mutual reconciliation. Russia incurred the wrath of Pyongyang in September 1990 by normalizing its relationship with South Korea. Relations have remained tense since then, despite North Korean-Russian bilateral talks in January 1993 aimed at improving the relationship and despite their interim accord that the 1961 mutual defense treaty would remain in place, until 1995, at least.20 According to Moscow, two major problems are yet to be resolved: Pyongyang's failure to pay off a part of its debt to Moscow (totalling 3.3 billion of hard currency ruble, at the 1990 exchange rate): and North Korea's insistence that Russia should stay out of Pyongyang's dispute with the IAEA over the safeguards inspection issue. 21 Pyongyang has remained silent about China's establishment of diplomatic relations with South Korea in 1992. With its increasingly weakened economic and security tie...
