Nobel Laureates and North Korea

Sometimes I really wonder what planet these people are on.

Past winners of the Nobel Peace Prize have come together in South Korea to call for peace on the Korean Peninsula and a resolution of the dispute over North Korea's nuclear weapons production. Former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, who hosted the gathering, says North Korea must return to talks aimed at disarmament - while the United States must make some compromises as well.

Why should the US make any compromise at all? This seems to be making the US the only broker in the issue of North Koreas nuclear and military activities. I could have sworn that there was at least one massive power right adjacent to North Korea, who never seems to do anything. And what about the UN? I thought that the US was being heavily criticized for going into actions alone. Shouldn't the UN be leading this?

Former South Korean president Kim Dae-jung, who won the prestigious peace prize in 2000, said Saturday that the international community - especially North Korea and the United States - must work harder to end Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programs.

Again, Why just the US? Especially considering the last time the US brought a large offering to the table and North Korea failed to uphold their side of the deal.

Wangari Mutha Maatai, a 2004 Nobel Peace laureate from Kenya, read the declaration aloud Saturday. It included a plea for mutual concessions by the U.S. and North Korea, which is also known by its official initials, the DPRK.

"We expect that the DPRK will completely abandon its nuclear weapons policy and accept international inspections," she said. "We also call for the U.S. to end financial and economic sanctions on the DPRK and offer security guarantees."

Funny, looks like she's marking the US as a bad guy in this. I see no reason for the US to provide any security guarantees. North Korea refuses to abide by settlements that benefitted them greatly, and now the US is the bad guy because it chose to remove those incentives when North Korea moved on with its nuclear program.

By the standards of these Nobel Laureates, you'd expect the US to be required to surrender everything to those that threaten the world so that the world can be safe. Sometimes the price is too high.