hankyoreh

The third U.S.-Korea summit since the inauguration of President Lee Myung-bak was held in Seoul on August 6. The joint statement clearly looks like effort was made at avoiding controversy, surely because of the ordeal over American beef and since U.S. President George W. Bush has but a few months left in office. Nevertheless, the substance of the summit shows you that Korea’s dependence on the United States is becoming ever more serious.

Most notable is the Lee administration’s two-faced attitude about North Korea policy. The joint statement mentions “President Lee’s recent proposal to resume inter-Korean dialogue and his initiative to help improve economic conditions for the North Korean people in the context of continued progress on denuclearization and offer a path for the two Koreas to live side-by-side in harmony and prosperity, opening the way to their eventual unification.” That is close to lying, because rather than pursuing a way of harmony and prosperity, President Lee has been turning back inter-Korean relations significantly by ignoring the October 4 Summit Declaration and the June 15 Joint Statement. The joint statement says President Bush wholly supports President Lee’s proposal to resume inter-Korean dialogue. It is a distortion made to look as if Lee has been pursuing a “future-oriented” North Korea policy and the United States supports it. Instead of obsessing with American support, we would hope the administration actually will put North Korea policy on the right path.

Also of questionable appropriateness is the part sharing “the view that there needed to be meaningful progress in the North Korean human rights situation during the course of normalizing ties between North Korea and the United States.” While there should be sustained approaches to North Korean human rights, there is no reason for Korea to side with the attempt by hard-liners in the United States to prevent progress in U.S.-North Korea relations by arbitrarily judging the issue. The fact the administration asked the United States to pressure North Korea over the shooting death of a South Korean tourist at Mount Geumgang (Kumgang), and the fact that mention of the issue was included in the summit statement, is problematic for how it will hurt independence in inter-Korean relations. As demonstrated in the episode over the ASEAN Regional Forum chairman’s statement, such attempts will likely lead only to wasteful confrontations with Pyongyang.

While in Seoul, President Bush asked for non-military Korean support for Afghanistan. The South Korean government should take this opportunity to say no to sending troops to Afghanistan and to extending the time Korean troops are in Iraq. The more dependent Seoul is on Washington in the area of foreign policy and security, the more demands Washington will make of Seoul. It is for that reason that the Lee administration’s idea of a “strategic alliance” is dangerous. Depending on the United States even for things like Seoul’s relations with Pyongyang is of no help to either North or South Korea and, for that matter, is not even helpful to the United States. We call on the Lee administration to wake up and come to its senses.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]