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South Korean President Moon Jae-in with US President Donald Trump during the former’s visit to the White House in July 2017. (Blue House photo pool)
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Reaffirms standard position that denuclearization takes priority above all other issues
The US government seems to be taking a wait-and-see attitude about South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s decision to send a special delegation to the North Korean capital of Pyongyang on Sept. 5 and has only reaffirmed its standard position that progress on inter-Korean relations must keep in step with progress on denuclearization. The apparent message is that the issue of North Korea’s denuclearization must be given priority in the special delegation’s visit to North Korea and the inter-Korean summit that’s scheduled for the middle of this month. Responding to a question by the foreign press on Aug. 31 about the South Korean government’s plan to dispatch a special delegation to North Korea, a spokesperson for the US State Department said that the US was focusing its efforts on closely coordinating a unified response to North Korea by the US and its allies South Korea and Japan. The State Department reiterated that improving inter-Korean relations cannot proceed separately from resolving the issue of the North Korean nuclear program, noting that South Korean President Moon Jae-in himself had already said as much. The State Department invoked remarks made by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during his tour of Asia in July to say that the US must maintain diplomatic and economic pressure on North Korea to bring about the North’s final and fully verified denuclearization, to which North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has agreed. While carrying out backroom talks with North Korea over denuclearization and the end-of-war declaration since the North Korea-US summit on June 12, the US State Department has publicly stated on multiple occasions that progress on inter-Korean relations must keep pace with denuclearization. North Korea wants the Korean War to be formally ended as the first step toward improving its relations with the US, but the US has countered by asking North Korea to take the first concrete steps toward denuclearization. “We’re in a place where the peace-related policies that have been adopted on the Korean Peninsula so far may be jeopardized unless South Korea can broker dialogue between North Korea and the US. In one way or another, Seoul has probably talked to the US about sending this special delegation,” said Koo Kab-woo, professor at the University of North Korean Studies. In recent weeks, the US has reportedly asked the South Korean government both directly and indirectly to slow down its efforts to improve inter-Korean relations, such as opening an inter-Korean liaison office in Kaesong in North Korea. But the US has apparently not expressed opposition to holding a third inter-Korean summit. By Hwang Joon-bum, Washington correspondent, and Noh Ji-won, staff reporter Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]
