hankyoreh

Kim Seong-bae, Senior Researcher, Institute for National Security Strategy

The inter-Korean summit scheduled for August 28 has been postponed 35 days, to October 2. It is being postponed because of the storm damage North Korea has suffered and there is all sorts of conjecture and there are many conspiracy theories, but they do not seem very convincing. North Korea has no reason to expose its own weaknesses and lose face.

There is a lot of analysis as to whether the postponement is a good thing or not, but in the end it is still unfortunate. The situation is not one in which one can be a hundred percent optimistic about productive six-party talks in early September, and one would have hoped that coming away from the summit with a firm commitment on denuclearization by North Korea’s National Defence Commission chairman Kim Jong-il would have provided the talks with considerable momentum.

The postponement would also appear to be a lost opportunity for the formalization of inter-Korean relations. There will be difficulty in building legally binding agreements from the summit and the various levels of talks that will follow and in establishing a time frame for implementing them. The possibility there will be unnecessary accusations that the postponement is political is also a political burden for the South Korean government.

Granted, one good thing about the delay is that it creates more than a month of time before the summit. The summit can be prepared for while the South Korean government watches to see what the results of the six-party talks are going to be and works closely with the countries participating in the talks. On the home front, it can consult the views of the country while establishing more substantial plans, based on the general sentiments of the South Korean public.

It looks like postponing the summit will not lead to a major change in the agenda when it does take place, but there might need to be a certain degree of adjustment to the strategy for ordering things and of what the priorities, in five areas, are going to be.

First, the South Korean government needs to gain the upper hand in political events on the Korean peninsula by strategically arranging its foreign affairs schedule up to the summit to prevent the loss of a sense of pressure and concentration because, since it already has more time on its hands, it should research the idea of having a summit with the United States, China, or Japan, even a working-level summit. This would also have the additional effect of putting unnecessary worries, in Korea and abroad, about the “pace” of relations to rest.

Secondly, this second summit comes following the sixth round of six-party talks. It is regrettable that the timing will have the effect of giving the appearance that inter-Korean relations are something that follow behind the North Korean nuclear issue, but the timing also relieves an excessive sense of burden about resolving the issue itself. We will have to see what comes out of the six-party talks, but the appropriate approach would be to have what comes out of them approved by the North and South’s highest leaders and have them “solidify” and “accelerate” a resolution on the nuclear issue.

Thirdly, all said and done, this summit will most likely concentrate on areas that are important to inter-Korean relations, whether they pertain to peace or economics. Therefore, we need to take the time factor into consideration and, in order to make what is decided more actionable, come up with a more focused agenda instead of enumerating a list of issues as if the summit were a department store. At the very least one would hope that within the year we would be able to see, through talks between defense ministers, comprehensive confidence-building measures, and the beginning of a framework between the relevant authorities for drawing the blueprint for an inter-Korean economic community.

Fourth, the focus needs to be placed on the formalization of inter-Korean relations in order to overcome the political burden of having the summit right in the middle of the presidential campaign season and to better guarantee the continuity of what the summit accomplishes. Making inter-Korean summits and various cabinet-level talks regularly scheduled occurrences and then handing them over to the next president would in and of itself be a very important accomplishment for inter-Korean relations, but it would also be very effective in dealing with the political controversy about the postponed summit’s timing, because it would structurally guarantee that what is accomplished by the summit is common property not belonging to any one South Korean political faction.

Finally, I would hope to see the government consider creating a amicable atmosphere for the summit with the mutual exchange of emissary delegations by the time Chuseok comes around. It is quite likely the North would accept a delegation on the occasion of this great traditional holiday for the Korean people, but there is also justification for it that would be valid domestically and internationally, in the sense it would be about condolences regarding the North’s recent storm damage.