With Obama in White House, North Korea Steps Up Big Talk

A senior official at North Korea's de facto embassy in Japan suggested in an interview that Pyongyang wants to grab the attention of the new leadership in Washington and pressure it, using threats of regional war, to lean on Lee.

"Ignoring North Korea is very dangerous," said So Chung On, director of the international affairs bureau for Chosen Soren, a Japan-based North Korean group that has close ties to Pyongyang and has often spoken for the government there. "If Obama ignores North Korea, maybe the Korean Peninsula will be tense."

He said North Korea wants the Obama administration to instruct South Korea that it should honor commitments -- on trade and food aid -- made by Lee's predecessors, Roh Moo-hyun and Kim Dae-jung.

Both Roh and Kim attended summits with Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang, where they signed far-reaching economic and political agreements with the North.

"Our military is very angry that South Korea is not abiding by the agreements made at those summits," So said. "Neglect of this is not so wise. The United States should send a message to Lee."

North Korea has signaled in recent weeks that it sees the presidency of Barack Obama as an opportunity for much-improved relations with the United States.

But on the eve of Obama's inauguration, the North also announced that it had turned its entire plutonium stockpile into weapons and that it is determined to remain a nuclear-armed nation until Washington abandons its "hostile policy" and the two countries can "normalize" their relations.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has said that the Obama administration is interested in direct negotiations with North Korea, but she emphasized that the United States will not normalize relations until the North gives up its nuclear weapons.

North Korea has built a new launch center for long-range missiles on its west coast, according to several reports that cite satellite images. On Tuesday, an intelligence source told Yonhap, the South Korean news agency, that a North Korean train carrying a long, tube-shaped object has recently been seen by U.S. and South Korean intelligence agencies and that it is thought to be a Taepodong-2 missile. Yonhap quoted a government source as saying the object could be headed for the new test site but could also be en route to an older site on the east coast or to an unidentified third location. A spokesman for the Defense Ministry declined to comment on the matter.

Taepodong-2 missiles are believed to be able to reach as far as Alaska. North Korea test-fired one in 2006, but it reportedly failed 40 seconds after launch. Citing intelligence officials, Japanese and South Korean media said the North's preparations for another long-range missile test are likely to be completed within two months.

Here in Seoul, some analysts say that if North Korea's threats against Lee's government continue, they are likely to result in a real, if limited, military clash.

North Korea will have to act at some point "because otherwise threats just become bluffing," said Cha Doo-hyun, director of North Korean research at the Korea Institute for Defense Analysis.