A surprising sphere of influence

ULAAN BAATAR, Mongolia -- While the world powers grapple with how to check North Korea's nuclear ambitions, Mongolia has quietly engaged the country and is pressing it to undertake reforms in a more direct manner.

The primary tool to woo Pyongyang is Mongolia's own successful transition from a Stalinist state to a free-market democracy.

Once allies within the Soviet bloc, North Korea and Mongolia chose very different tacks after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990. While North Korea's continuing Stalinism has brought it to the brink of collapse, Mongolia undertook a series of political and economic reforms that revitalized the country.

"I really believe that Mongolia's experience is very much transferable to North Korea, and we can become a kind of transition consultant to them," Tsakhiagiyn Elbegdorj, Mongolia's prime minister, said in a recent interview. The North Koreans "listen to us because we're not Western people trying to teach them [the Western] way of life. We are like them, and through workshops and meetings we are simply sharing our knowledge, our experience with them."

Pamela Slutz, the US ambassador in Ulaan Baatar, said there is evidence that the effort is bearing fruit, partly because "the two countries share extensive cultural, ethnic, and diplomatic ties" and North Korea sees Mongolia as non-threatening.

"Mongolia supports our call for a denuclearized Korean peninsula, and we consult very closely with them to make sure what they are doing doesn't undermine US efforts," Slutz said.

Over the past two years, Mongolia and North Korea have exchanged several high-level delegations, and in August North Korea reopened its embassy in Ulaan Baatar five years after it closed because of what Pyongyang termed financial reasons.

But most of the cooperation is being channeled through "back-door diplomacy," said Baabar, an adviser to Elbegdorj and a founder of the Northeast Asia Association, an organization committed to improving Mongolia's ties with North Korea. Baabar, who like many Mongolians uses only one name, says he has visited North Korea more than 30 times in the past few years.

"Officially, the North Koreans say they have no interest, but unofficially there is great curiosity at how our step-by-step movement to the market system worked," he said. "They ask us a lot of questions and want to find ways to make money. Now, there is a new black market in Pyongyang [and] that means at least they're learning how a market works."

Beyond North Korea's nuclear standoff with the United States, the country is also attempting economic reforms. Visitors to Pyongyang say they are now able to rent mobile phones and ice skates from private businesses, something unthinkable a short time ago.

Large free-trade zones are also being set up in several cities, Baabar said. The largest is at a town along the South Korean border named Kaesong.

By encouraging the minuscule economic reforms in North Korea, Mongolia hopes it can offer Pyongyang a carrot to complement the US stick, Baabar said.

Doing this is in Mongolia's interest because North Korea's peaceful transition to a more open system would foster economic growth in the region, and open up the possibility of a trade pipeline between the Koreas and Europe, via Russia and Mongolia.

On the other hand, Mongolia would suffer from a conflict in the Korean peninsula. All the parties likely to be involved in the conflict, South Korea, Japan, China, and Russia, are Mongolia's largest trading partners, and overseas trade for this landlocked country would grind to a halt.

"North Korea is no danger to the world; the real danger will come if it collapses," Baabar said. On the other hand, he said, if relations between North Korea and its neighbors improved, economic integration among Japan, China, Mongolia, Russia, and the two Koreas could create a trade bloc that would reach Europe.

Geography and political ties aside, what puts Mongolia in a unique position to press North Korea are the "unique ties of blood" between Mongolians and Koreans, said Baabar, who is also a well-known historian here. Ethnically, Koreans and Mongolians belong to the Altaic language family. Many Korean clans are believed to have come from eastern Mongolia.

Observers and regional analysts, particularly in China, are skeptical about the extent Mongolia can influence on North Korea.

"I don't think Mongolia can seriously affect such a situation," said Shi Yinhong, professor of international studies at the People's University in Beijing.

China is North Korea's largest source of foreign aid and likes to see itself as the chief interlocutor between Pyongyang and Washington. It is also acutely conscious of Mongolia's fierce determination to resist growing Chinese influence in the region.