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President Moon speaks with US Vice President Mike Pence and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the Blisshill Stay at Yongpyong Resort in Pyeongchang County

On Feb. 9, US Vice President Mike Pence departed early from a welcome reception that South Korean President Moon Jae-in had organized before the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics began. Because Pence did not stay for the event, he did not meet Kim Yong-nam, president of the Presidium of North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly, thus scuttling the first encounter between state leaders from North Korea and the US. Pence’s unexpected behavior at an official event for state leaders that had been coordinated in advance is regarded as a break with diplomatic protocol. It also throws a wrench into Moon’s plan to arrange a meeting between Pence and Kim Yong-nam during the Olympics that could lead to North Korea-US dialogue in the future.

On the afternoon of Feb. 9, Moon held a reception before the opening ceremony for over 200 dignitaries from South Korea and overseas at the Blisshill Stay at Yongpyong Resort in Pyeongchang County, Gangwon Province. The invited figures included International Olympic Committee Chairman Thomas Bach, UN Secretary-General António Guterres and the state leaders and their spouses that were visiting South Korea for the Pyeongchang Olympics.

Twelve people were supposed to sit at the head table with Moon and his wife, including Kim Yong-nam, Pence and his wife, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Communist Party of China (CPC) Politburo Standing Committee member Han Zheng, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his wife, Bach and his wife and Guterres. Pence was supposed to sit immediately to Moon’s left, and Kim Yong-nam four seats on Moon’s right.

Gangwon Province on Feb. 9. (Photo Pool)

At 5:17 pm, before the reception, Moon and First Lady Kim Jung-sook began briefly greeting and taking commemorative photos with the guests, starting with Bach and his wife. But Pence and Abe did not arrive until 10 minutes after the reception began at 6 pm. Because the other leaders were waiting inside the reception area, Moon went inside at 6:11 pm without taking a photo with Pence and Abe to begin his welcome address. “Some of us would likely never have gathered together if not for the Pyeongchang Olympics, but it is important that we are together and that we are able to cheer on the athletes together and talk about the future. The very fact that we are together will serve as a precious starting point that will take us one step closer toward world peace,” Moon said.

While Moon was finishing his welcome address, Pence and Abe took a commemorative photo by themselves in a separate room without entering the reception area. After the address was over, Moon headed to the room where they were waiting and took a photo showing the leaders of South Korea, the US and Japan. At 6:39 pm, the three men walked into the reception hall together, and even at this point it looked as if the reception would be uneventful.

But without sitting down at the head table, Pence shook hands with all the leaders except for Kim Yong-nam and then left the reception area at 6:44 pm. Senior Secretary to the President for Public Relations Yoon Young-chan attempted to smooth over the diplomatic fracas over Pence’s unexpected behavior by saying, “Vice President Pence had dinner plans at 6:30 pm with the American athletes and had notified us about this in advance. We didn’t even have a seat for him at the table. He was planning to leave the area immediately after taking a photo, but he stopped by the reception area after President Moon urged him to see some friends before leaving.”

“Vice President Pence had hinted that he would not attend the reception while we were still arranging the schedule,” Yoon added.

President Moon Jae-in watches the opening ceremony of the Pyeongchang Olympics with his wife Kim Jung-sook on Feb. 9. (Photo Pool)

But as recently as that morning, the Blue House had said that Pence would be attending the reception, explaining that it had “cleared the seating at the head table with both North Korea and the US.” Blue House officials even said that “simply having Vice President Pence and Presidium President Kim Yong-nam sitting at the same table will send a significant message.” Before the dinner began, there was even a name tag at the head table that said “United States of America.” In the end, Pence’s departure from the reception area was unplanned, making it a severe diplomatic gaffe.

Pence’s unexpected behavior appears to have reflected his displeasure with sitting so close to Kim Yong-nam. He used the diplomatic faux-pas of breaking his promise to attend the reception to bluntly express his strong opposition to the inter-Korean dialogue and North Korea-US dialogue that Moon has been advocating. During a dinner with Moon the previous day, Pence said that the US continue to “bring maximum pressure to bear on North Korea until that time comes when they finally and permanently and irreversibly abandon their nuclear and ballistic missile ambitions.” And during a summit with Abe in Japan prior to arriving in South Korea, Pence said that the US would soon be imposing the toughest and most aggressive sanctions on North Korea.

Pence’s attitude suggests that severe challenges await future dialogue between North Korea and the US. It also presents a formidable obstacle to Moon’s desired scenario, in which the Pyeongchang “Peace Olympics” enable the expansion of inter-Korean dialogue, leading to North Korea-US dialogue and culminating in the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the signing of a peace treaty.

President Moon Jae-in greets Kim Yong-nam

“Vice President Pence’s action can be read as a message about the US’s hardline policy toward North Korea in the future. President Moon’s planned path toward North Korea-US dialogue looks rocky,” said Kim Yeon-cheol, a professor of unification studies at Inje University.

Prior to this, Pence and the father of Otto Warmbier, the American university student who had been detained in North Korea and died after returning home, visited the South Korean Navy’s Second Fleet Command in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province and met with some North Korean defectors there. During this event, Pence criticized North Korea as “a regime that imprisons, and tortures, and impoverishes its citizens.” When Pence came to South Korea to celebrate the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics on behalf of US President Donald Trump, he made a series of hardline remarks about North Korea prior to the beginning of the games.

Around noon on Feb. 9, Pence arrived at the Second Fleet Headquarters, which displays the ROKS Cheonan, a South Korean naval vessel that was sunk in the waters near the Northern Limit Line (NLL) in the West Sea in 2010. Pence visited the West Sea Defense Memorial and the Cheonan Memorial with Gen. Vincent Brooks, commander of Combined Forces Command, and Gen. Kim Byeong-joo, deputy commander of Combined Forces Command. After that, Pence met with Ji Seong-ho and three other North Korean defectors in a meeting area prepared in the Second Fleet Headquarters.

Pence told the North Korean defectors that they speak for millions of people who crave freedom. Remarking that there are concentration camps in North Korea, that more than 70% of North Koreans cannot get by without humanitarian aid and that children suffer from malnutrition, he asked the defectors to tell him their own stories.

After hearing the defectors share their experiences, Pence said, "President Trump said the cruel dictatorship of North Korea is little more than a prison state, as [North Korean defectors] testified it is a regime that imprisons and tortures and impoverishes its citizens.”

By Seong Yeon-cheol and Noh Ji-won, staff reporters and Yi Yong-in, Washington correspondent

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