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The first special delegation to North Korea arrives at Seoul Air Base in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, on Mar. 6 after their Pyongyang visit. From the left are pictured NIS senior official Kim Sang-gyun, NIS Director Suh Hoon, House National Security Office Director Chung Eui-yong, Vice Unification Minister Chun Hae-sung, and Blue House Governance Situation Room Director Yun Geon-yeong. (photo pool)
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Speculation abounds regarding how delegation will break current NK-US deadlock
The Blue House’s announcement on Sept. 2 of the members of a special delegation to North Korea that will be visiting Pyongyang on Sept. 5 has prompted speculation about whether the envoys will seek a breakthrough in the deadlock between North Korea and the US – epitomized by the abrupt cancellation of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s planned trip to the North – along with coordinating the upcoming third inter-Korean summit in Pyongyang. The delegation, which will be led by Blue House National Security Office Director Chung Eui-yong, is likely to not only finalize the schedule for the inter-Korean summit, which is expected to be held in the middle of this month, but also hold in-depth deliberations with the North about a plan that South Korean President Moon Jae-in has developed to broker the dispute between North Korea and the US over denuclearization and formally declaring the end of the Korean War. As is customary, the special delegation is predicted to deliver a personal letter from Moon to the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The members of the delegation who were announced on Sunday are identical to those of the first special delegation, who met Chairman Kim Jong-un this past March. Their selection is presumably aimed at taking advantage of the trust formed through the deep conversations that were part of their meetings with a range of key North Korean officials as well as Kim. “The special delegation members have built up enough trust and are well-informed about the matters [they need to deliberate] in order to achieve their goals on a trip that will last a single day, unlike [the two-day trip] in March,” explained a senior official at the Blue House. Special envoy’s arbitration plan is crucial Since the special delegation’s visit is designed to coordinate the topics that Kim and Moon will discuss in their third summit, there are likely to be wide-ranging deliberations on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the establishment of peace and economic cooperation. Though South and North Korea held high-level talks at the Tongilgak building in Panmunjom on July 13, they were unable to make any progress aside from agreeing to hold the summit in Pyongyang. The opening of the inter-Korean liaison office in Kaesong, which was supposed to happen last month, was delayed, and a joint inspection of a North Korean railroad with the aim of connecting inter-Korean roads and railways fell through when the UN Command withheld its authorization. “There will be a wide-ranging deliberation of the content of the Apr. 27 Panmunjom Declaration aimed at developing inter-Korean relations,” said a senior official at the Blue House. Since the North Koreans are expressing dissatisfaction about the lack of progress on the follow-up measures to the Panmunjom Declaration, the envoys are likely to negotiate specific ways to speed up their implementation prior to Kim and Moon’s meeting. The envoys are also expected to table a plan for mediating the deadlock between North Korea and the US. “The deliberations will also cover denuclearization, the end-of-war declaration and the establishment of permanent peace based on the June 12 agreement reached on Sentosa Island [by the leaders of North Korea and the US]. We have been in close consultation with the US prior to the special delegation’s visit to the North,” a senior official at the Blue House said. North Korea is currently in a dispute with the US because the North wants the US to make an end-of-war declaration before it takes steps toward denuclearization. The delegation will be making an effort to bridge the gap between North Korea and the US by communicating the American position to the North while also seeking to breathe new life into a proposal for South Korea, North Korea, the US and China to make an end-of-war declaration during the UN General Assembly at the end of this month. Experts in unification, foreign policy and security assert that the specificity of the special delegation’s arbitration plan is a crucial factor that will determine whether the visit leads to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and an end-of-war declaration. Importance of South’s “forward-looking attitude” in hammering out details “Most of the obstacles to implementing the Panmunjom Declaration are sanctions against North Korea. North Korea may be displeased with the fact that the South Koreans have not made much of an effort to overcome those sanctions themselves. The key is how much of a forward-looking attitude the South Korean government has,” said Koo Kab-woo, professor at the University of North Korean Studies. “Another important question is whether the special delegation will bring a plan that lays out for North Korea a specific scenario for making an end-of-war declaration and proposes the actions that the North can take to make that a reality,” Koo went on to say. “Whereas the special delegation that visited North Korea in March played the role of a general mediator that opened the door for North Korea-US dialogue, this time around its mediation role should be hammering out the details. It needs to bring a plan that can sort out the areas of disagreement between North Korea and the US, including denuclearization and the end-of-war declaration,” said Hong Min, director of North Korean research at the Korea Institute for National Unification. Along with this, the special delegation will be discussing the inter-Korean liaison office in Kaesong, which has been caught up in the delay of Pompeo’s visit to the North. “I also expect that the special delegation will finalize the date of the opening of the liaison office during its visit to the North,” said a senior official at the Blue House. By Kim Bo-hyeop and Noh Ji-won, staff reporters Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]
