The United States will press for an oil embargo against North Korea if talks to open that nation's nuclear facilities to international inspection fail, a top White House official said Sunday.
White House Chief of Staff Thomas McLarty said the Clinton administration first intends to continue negotiations with North Korea to persuade it to comply with anti-nuclear weapons agreements."Hopefully, discussions will produce a satisfactory result," McLarty said on ABC television's "This Week with David Brinkley."
Failing that, the United States would seek U.N. support to apply economic pressure on North Korea.
"The next step, I think, would be on the economic front with the consideration of certain embargoes, particularly petroleum," McLarty said.
North Korea rattled the world in March by withdrawing from a nuclear safeguard treaty to prevent an international inspection of two of its nuclear sites.
This raised fears that North Korea was developing nuclear weapons that could be used to threaten South Korea. Administration officials have said the United States would come to the defense of South Korea should it be invaded by the North.
Economic sanctions could prove a harsh weapon against the struggling communist North Korea, dragged down by international isolation, collapse of its barter trade with the former Soviet bloc and high military spending. Unconfirmed reports circulate of food and energy shortages.
State Department officials tried to defuse the nuclear crisis at a meeting Dec. 10 with North Korea representatives.
But North Korea's communist leadership underwent a shake-up last week and has yet to respond to U.S. demands for full inspection of all nuclear sites, not just five offered.
Imposing U.N. economic sanctions would require obtaining the support of China, one of the five permanent members of the the U.N. Security Council with veto power.
McLarty and another top official Sunday both indicated that the administration was working on that issue.
Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen, asked on NBC television whether the administration would offer China liberal trade terms if it supports de-nuclearization of North Korea, acknowledged that this economic weapon carries some punch in China.
"What we are seeing is our pointing out to them the importance of our economic ties and the amount of markets we can offer them and that has a great deal of influence," Bentsen said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
McLarty said on ABC that U.S. officials already have held talks with China on the subject at the economic summit with Asian nations in Seattle last month. He said the Chinese are "not sanguine" about prospects of another nuclear power sitting on their border.