The State Department has announced that the United States will resume nuclear talks with North Korea next week for the first time since 2005. The talks are welcomed by Kim Jong-il, who even hinted at the possibility of resuming six-party talks to end his country’s nuclear program. Separate negotiations currently taking place in Bangkok will also touch on the remains of American soldiers still missing in action from the Korean War. Almost 8,000 men are still missing from that conflict, and the remains of nearly 5,500 are thought to be in North Korea. David Sanger, of The New York Times and WQXR’s Washington Report, discusses what makes this moment right for resuming talks. Richard Downes, president of the Coalition of Families of Korean and Cold War POWs/MIAs, talks about the hopes and fears of families of MIA soldiers. Downes’ father went missing on January 13, 1952 and is still MIA in North Korea.
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