The United States is seeking a U.N. resolution this week telling North Korea to allow international experts to finish inspecting its nuclear plants or face trade sanctions.
"That really is a decision that's up to the North Koreans," President Clinton said Sunday.
"I have done everything I could to avoid racheting up the tensions."
North Korea's isolated and militant regime, which may already have two atom bombs, today renewed its threat to pull out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
It also has:
-- Refused to give international inspectors full access.
-- Broken off talks with South Korea over making their shared peninsula nuclear-free.
-- Been developing missiles that could carry warheads to South Korea and Japan.
"We want them to accept full inspections and . . . restart their dialogue with South Korea," Secretary of State Warren Christopher said Sunday on CBS' Face the Nation.
Any new U.N. resolution would require acquiescence from China, North Korea's ally, which has a veto.
It's possible sanctions wouldn't work. There would be leakage from China, and North Korea is used to hardships, said University of Georgia professor Han Park, who visited North Korea last fall.
"They can endure .. . . for a prolonged period, maybe a full year or even more," he said.
The Pentagon has renewed planning for military exercises with South Korea, and U.S. lawmakers say the administration must push the South to let in U.S. Patriot missiles.
"Send additional forces to send a signal to North Korea that we're serious about this," said Senate Minority Leader Robert Dole, R-Kan.
