hankyoreh

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met in Washington on Feb. 25 and exchanged their countries’positions on the Korean Peninsula, where tensions have been mounting since North Korea‘s recent fourth nuclear test and long-range rocket launch. This meeting was crucial in terms of both timing and content, since it sets the stage for how the peninsula’s issues are going to be addressed going ahead. The sad thing is that the Park Geun-hye administration’s blind, strategy-free hard-line diplomacy prevented it from projecting its rightful presence in that process.

At a press conference after their meeting, the two ministers underscored three main points. First, they said they had generally bridged their differences on an upcoming United Nations Security Council resolution sanctioning North Korea for its nuclear test and rocket launch. While he didn’t offer specifics, Wang said there had been “important progress” in their deliberations, adding that there was a “possibility of reaching agreement on the draft resolution and passing it in the near future.” Kerry implied that the terms would apply even greater pressure on Pyongyang, saying that “if the resolution is approved, it will go beyond anything that we have previously passed.” But the “appropriate response” that Kerry referred to seems quite a different thing from the “final resolution” the Park administration has talked about.

Second, there was also official discussion of not only sanctioning North Korea, but also addressing the peace treaty issue and bringing Pyongyang to the table for dialogue. Wang officially proposed a parallel track approach of denuclearization and pursuing a peace treaty, while Kerry said the US was prepared to discuss a treaty if Pyongyang agreed to a certain period of denuclearization - very different from the ultra-hard-line plan for replacing the North Korean regime that the Park administration has declared since the rocket launch. This can‘t be called anything but a diplomatic failure by an administration that has insisted on responding in an emotional, insular way without taking the time to read any other countries’ aims.

The third matter concerned the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system on the Korean Peninsula. Responding to China’s objections, Kerry asserted, “If we can get to denuclearization [of North Korea], there’s no need to deploy THAAD.” At the same time, he also said the US was “not hungry or anxious or looking for an opportunity to be able to deploy THAAD.” This suggests that Washington is more than capable of deferring the decision, depending on how the situation plays out. It also undercuts the Park administration‘s claims about the USFK THAAD deployment being “a self-defense measure against the growing North Korean nuclear and missile threat that is to be decided according to South Korea’s security and interests.” If we also consider the fact that a Feb. 23 signing ceremony for an agreement by the South Korea-US Joint Working Group to discuss the deployment was abruptly postponed, it gives the unmistakable impression that the administration is flirting with disaster in its rush to raise an issue that is beyond its ability to deal with.

What the outcome of these talks shows is that the Park administration’s diplomacy has been neither strategic nor practical. It’s time to fix this course and find a way of giving Seoul back ownership of peninsula issues.

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