Friday, October 3, 2008

Obama Foreign Policy Advisor on Korea Policy

In a community event sponsored by Virginia Korean-Americans for Obama, Frank Jannuzi, Senior Foreign Policy Advisor/Korea Policy Team leader to the Obama Campaign and East Asia specialist of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, highlighted the Obama/Biden campaign's foreign policy issues, specifically on Korea-related issues. The event took place on Oct. 2 in Annandale, Virginia.
Mr. Jannuzi's talk suggests that:

1. With regard to the Korea-US FTA, Obama will support its passage during his administration on the condition that (1) Korea adopts changes that allow for the import of more U.S. automobiles and (2) he gets trade adjustment assistance authority to help those U.S. workers affected by the FTA.

2. With regard to international policy in general, Obama (1) supports the notion of restoring America's respect around the world, (2) negotiating with adversaries without precondition (but with significant preparation) to address crisis issues, (3) having a plan to withdraw troops from Iraq within 16 months, and (4) re-deploying an additional few brigades in Afghanistan to root out bin Laden and al-Qaeda, (5) strengthen the assistance of Pakistani leadership to address al-Qaeda.

3. Similarly, with regard to the Korean nuclear security issue, Obama supports (1) the current strategy of ending NK's nuclear program by verifying NK's declarations, (2) using both multilateral (via 6 party talks and, later, a more permanent security mechanism) and bilateral talks to achieve ends, (3) negotiating with NK at the highest levels, including Sec. of State, and even himself if he thinks that it would make a critical difference, and (4) addressing the human rights issues.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

It was great event. It helped me to understand Sen. Obama's policy on Korea issues. I hope he will win this race and bring the NK issues back on the table again and find the ways to normalize US-NK relations for the sake of starving people of NK.

For all your Korean-American volunteers, you guys rock! Thanks for representing our community well.