By Reuben Staines
Staff Reporter

Former President Kim Dae-jung on Thursday urged North Korea and the United States to engage in direct talks, saying the standoff over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programs is entering a ``very ominous’’ stage.

``The current situation surrounding the Korean Peninsula is reaching crisis point,’’ Kim said during a lecture at Hanshin University in Osan, Kyonggi Province, referring to news reports that North Korea may be preparing to conduct a nuclear test.

He said Washington and Pyongyang should urgently meet and hammer out a framework to resolve the deepening nuclear standoff.

``North Korea must completely abandon its nuclear programs and the United States must guarantee the security of North Korea and lift economic sanctions,’’ said Kim, who was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize for his ``sunshine’’ policy of engaging the communist North.

``If and only if North Korea and the U.S. come forward with this kind of approach can the six-way talks act to guarantee the deal,’’ he said.

The comments came one day after an announcement by the North that it has finished unloading 8,000 spent fuel rods from its Yongbyon reactor and will transfer them into cooling tanks for reprocessing into weapons-grade plutonium.

However, despite Pyongyang’s provocative statement, the former president warned the U.S. against taking rash countermeasures.

Commenting on speculation that Washington might consider launching a pinpoint strike to take out the North’s nuclear facilities, he said, ``We cannot agree to a preemptive strike as it would lead to annihilation of the Korean people.’’

Kim, who met North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in a breakthrough summit in 2000, said while friendly relations between North Korea and the U.S. may seem impossible now, the thawing of ties between other Cold War foes shows what can be achieved through diplomacy.

``The U.S. once labeled the former Soviet Union evil, but now it has stable diplomatic ties with Russia,’’ he said. ``The basis of diplomacy is to engage in dialogue, regardless of differences, in order to maintain peace and security.’’

The ruling and the opposition parties also expressed growing concerns about the North’s moves to increase its nuclear arsenal.

A spokesman for the ruling Uri Party urged Pyongyang to halt its reprocessing and return to the six-party talks, which have been stalled for the past 11 months.

He said the North’s actions are in violation of an inter-Korean agreement to maintain a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.

The main opposition Grand National Party, meanwhile, slammed the government for failing to take North Korea’s nuclear ambitions seriously enough.

Seoul has tried to play down the rising tensions over the nuclear issue and continues to pursue social and economic engagement with its reclusive other half.

rjs@koreatimes.co.kr