Analysis Of Sino-us Cooperation In The Second North Korean Nuclear Crisis Is Resolved

The North Korean Issue, which dated back to the early 1990s, can be rated as one of the most complicated and thorny international issues in the contemporary world. So far, there have been three nuclear crises on the Korean peninsula that attracted worldwide attention. All of them have brought about profound and lasting effects on the security situation of the Asian-Pacific region after the cold war. These effects not only result in change of the regional security form and restructure of the international powers'comparison, but also endanger the peaceful unification of the Korean peninsula.China and the U.S. have their own political, economic, military and ideological interests on the North Korean nuclear issue, sharing a common goal of the denuclearization of the peninsula as well as the maintenance of northeast Asia's security and stabilization. Since the outbreak of the second North Korean nuclear crisis, China and the U.S. have been cooperating closely with each other, which created the six-party talks and achieved a great deal. The two countries still have some divergent opinions because of different interest priority. Nevertheless, these divergences would not hamper the overall situation of Sino-U.S. cooperation. The experience of Sino-U.S. collaboration on the North Korean nuclear issue offers several valuable lessons: cooperation between China and the U.S. on a critical security issue requires a sufficient overlap of interests, but not full convergence; divergences are inevitable consequences of deep conflicts; lack of mutual trust can be ameliorated through frequent communication. The Sino-U.S. collaboration on the North Korean nuclear issue exerts great influence on Sino-U.S. relations that contributes to the enhancement of mutual credibility, the exploration of establishing northeast Asia security mechanism, and the practice of new Sino-U.S. cooperating pattern.The U.S.-North Korea contact has added a new factor to Sino-U.S. cooperation. Apart from bilateral dialogue with North Korea, the U.S. is insisting on a multilateral approach, continuing to persuade China to share responsibility for a nuclear-free peninsula. China's role, therefore, remains indispensible. China and the U.S. should jointly advance cooperation in the framework of six-party talks, and work hard to extend it to other security instances.