Korean tensions ease after threats
North Korea backed away from threats to retaliate against South Korea for military exercises today and offered concessions on its nuclear programme.
There was hope it was looking to lower the temperature on the Korean peninsula after weeks of soaring tensions.
But Pyongyang has feinted toward conciliation before and failed to follow it up.
The North's gestures came after South Korea launched fighter jets, evacuated hundreds of residents near its land border with the North and sent residents of islands near disputed waters into underground bunkers in case Pyongyang followed through on its vow to attack over the drills.
"It appears that deterrence has been restored," said Daniel Pinkston, Seoul-based analyst with the International Crisis Group think tank. "The North Koreans only understand force or show of force."
This is not the first time that the North has taken the international community down this road. The North has previously been accused of using a mix of aggression and conciliatory gestures to force international negotiations that usually net it much-needed aid. Real progress, meanwhile, on efforts to rid the North of its nuclear weapons programmes has been rare.
Today's drills came nearly a month after the North shelled Yeonpyeong Island, a tiny enclave of fishing communities and military bases about seven miles from North Korean shores, in response to an earlier round of South Korean live-fire manoeuvres.
The North Korean artillery barrage killed two marines and two construction workers in its first attack targeting civilian areas since the 1950-53 Korean War. It sent tensions soaring between the two countries - which are still technically at war.
They have remained in a tense stand-off since the November 23 attack, and an emergency meeting of UN diplomats in New York yesterday failed to find any solution to the crisis.
But today brought some of the first positive signs in weeks, as a high-profile American governor announced what he said were two nuclear concessions from the North.
New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, a frequent unofficial envoy to North Korea and former US ambassador to the UN, said that during his visit the North agreed to let UN atomic inspectors visit its main nuclear complex to make sure it is not producing enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb.
The North expelled UN inspectors last year, and last month showed a visiting American scientist a new, highly advanced uranium enrichment facility that could give it a second way to make atomic bombs, in addition to its plutonium program.
Mr Richardson also said that Pyongyang was willing to sell fresh fuel rods, potentially to South Korea.
Pyongyang is believed to be seeking one-on-one talks with the United States before returning to stalled nuclear disarmament negotiations hosted by China.
The US, however, has indicated that a resumption of those talks, without meaningful movement on past nuclear commitments from the North, could be seen as rewarding North Korea for behaving badly.
China, on the other hand, has urged a resumption of the talks, and over the weekend, diplomats said it successfully prevented the UN Security Council from issuing a statement condemning the North's shelling - as the US and others had wanted.
Beijing is the North's most important ally and has come under pressure to leverage its influence to rein in the North in the wake of the attack.
North Korea called today's drills a "reckless military provocation" but said after they ended that it was holding its fire because Seoul had changed its firing zones.
The official Korean Central News Agency carried a military statement that suggested that the North viewed the drills differently from the ones that provoked it last month because South Korean shells landed farther south of the North's shores.
The North claims the waters around Yeonpyeong as its territory, and during last month's artillery exchange, the North accused the South of firing artillery into its waters; the South said it fired shells southward, not toward the North.
