Former President Kim Dae-jung will fly to Washington Monday to give speeches and meet with U.S.
officials and opinion leaders on North Korea's nuclear ambitions, a peace mechanism for the Korean Peninsula and other regional security issues, an aide to Kim said Sunday.
The trip to the United States by Kim, a Nobel peace laureate and the architect of the sunshine policy of engaging North Korea, comes ahead of the second inter-Korean summit scheduled for Pyongyang in early October and a fresh round of six-nation talks on North Korea's denuclearization this week.
Kim is believed to still have enormous influence on the North Korea policy of his successor, President Roh Moo-hyun, who is also a proponent of engagement with North Korea.
Kim held the unprecedented inter-Korean summit in 2000 that produced a series of rapprochement measures between the Cold War foes. Among them were the construction of a South Korean industrial park in the North's border town of Kaesong and the building of a tourism project for South Koreans and foreigners in the North's scenic Keumgang Mountain.
Roh and his U.S. counterpart George W. Bush agreed in Sydney last week that they would pursue a peace agreement with North Korea to formally end the 1950-53 Korean War if the North verifiably abandons its nuclear weapons and related programs.
While touring the U.S. for 13 days, Kim will deliver a speech to the National Press Club in Washington on the summit between Roh and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il and ways to seek a permanent peace regime on the Korean Peninsula, the aide, Choi Kyung-hwan, said.
"We hope former President Kim's U.S. trip will be helpful to the six-party talks and the inter-Korean summit," Choi said.
"Former President Kim will focus on the importance of the second inter-Korean summit and peace on the Korean Peninsula as the North Korean nuclear issue is being resolved."
Kim is scheduled to meet with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. former U.S.
President Bill Clinton, former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and other dignitaries.
SEOUL, Sept. 16 (Yonhap)