CONFRONTATION OR COMPROMISE ON THE KOREAN PENINSULA - THE NORTH-KOREAN NUCLEAR ISSUE

North Korea's announced IAEA withdrawal, on June 13, 1994, triggered t he UN Security Council move to impose economic sanctions on North Kore a. This, in turn, followed from North Korea's replacing fuel rods at t he Yongbyon experimental reactor in May, without IAEA inspectors prese nt to determine whether plutonium was about to be extracted from the s pent fuel. As the North Korean act of defiance prompted the Korean cri sis, tension escalated and the danger of another Korean War increased in the summer of 1994. The crisis was defused, however, by the timely intervention and personal diplomacy of former US President Jimmy Carte r who travelled to Pyongyang to arrange for a compromise settlement. T he subsequent US-DPRK high-level talks in Geneva produced a 4-part agr eement that will serve as a package deal of possible accommodation, al though the ultimate resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue remai ns uncertain. The essay examines the background of the 1994 Korean cri sis and the nature of relationship between the IAEA and the DPRK as re gards the NPT and safeguards accord obligations of North Korea. North Korea was clearly not in full compliance with the IAEA demand for on-s ite inspections of either declared or undeclared nuclear sites. Jimmy Carter's ''private'' missions to Pyongyang are analyzed and his meetin g with now-deceased North Korean President Kim Il Sung is detailed. Th e subsequent package deal, worked out at the Geneva talks, provides th e basis of a compromise settlement of the North Korean nuclear issue. But the question remains as to how realistic and feasible it is for th is arrangement of a quid-pro-quo resolution of the Korean conflict. As diplomatic methods for settling international disputes, the article n otes basic differences, first of all, between confrontation and accomm odation as mutually exclusive approaches and ways of dealing with inte rnational conflict, as well as between compromise and accommodation. A ttempts to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue have alternated betw een confrontation and accommodation as a way of resolving the Korean c onflict. Confrontation entailing a military showdown, possibly leading to war, has momentarily been replaced by talk of compromise and accom modation involving diplomatic negotiation and bargaining, in a game-li ke situation, which may well result in peace and stability. However, c ompromise that entails an act of concession and give-and-take trading is in general less stable and lasting than genuine accommodation that reflects the mutual recognition of rival interests and rapprochement.