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South Korean President Moon Jae-in attends a ceremony commemorating the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War at Seoul Air Base on June 25. (Blue House photo pool)

The topics that South Korean President Moon Jae-in broached on the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War were “officially ending the war,” “peace,” and “prosperity.” With inter-Korean tensions in a rocky phase due to the dissemination of propaganda leaflets, he directed a message to Pyongyang calling for joint efforts to convert the Korean Armistice Agreement into an official peace treaty.

Moon spoke at a commemorative ceremony for the 70th anniversary of the Korean War’s outbreak on June 25 at Seoul Air Base in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. “A Korean Peninsula of peace and prosperity is something that we must achieve for our parents’ generation who lived through the war, and for the future generations who will open up the next 70 years,” Moon said.

“I hope that North Korea will also make bold efforts to end the saddest war in world history,” Moon’s call to end the war was his first response to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s order to suspend military activities toward the South on June 23.

In his message, Moon signaled his intent to go back to basics amid the current situation of damaged inter-Korean trust.

“We will continue working constantly to find a path for shared prosperity between South and North through peace,” he said.

“Before speaking of ‘reunification,’ I hope that we can first become congenial neighbors,” he added.

Moon gives a speech calling for peace during a ceremony commemorating the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War at Seoul Air Base on June 25. (Blue House photo pool)

Moon also stressed that he had “no thought of imposing our systems on North Korea” and that South Korea “hopes to pursue peace and prosper together.” At the same time, he emphasized, “To speak of reunification, we must first achieve peace, and we can only open the door to reunification after peace has been long established.”

For the first time ever, a commemorative ceremony for the Korean War was held in a Seoul Air Base hangar after dark. The decision was a gesture to the veterans and family members attending the event, who were senior citizens sensitive to the heat. Attending such a commemorative ceremony for the first time since taking office, Moon underscored the importance of unity.

“The threat of war continues at this very moment, and we are fighting a war not only against invisible threats but also the invisible animosity among us. We must end this long war to make the Korean War into a historical experience shared by everyone, uniting generations and philosophies,” he said.

The same day, Moon personally welcomed the return of the remains of 147 South Korean soldiers killed in the war, which had arrived on the South Korean soil for the first time in 70 years. Exhumed from North Korea over a period of more than 25 years starting in the 1990s, the remains were identified by the US as belonging to soldiers from the South Korean military. To repatriate them, a state-of-the-art KC-330 aerial tanker traveled to Hawaii.

“Your homeland will never forget you, even for a moment,” Moon pledged.

“The government will forever remember the heroes who defended their nation,” he said.

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Video messages sent by the leaders of 22 countries that fought for the UN side in the Korean War were also shown at the event. US President Donald Trump sent a video message in which he praised the UN forces and all countries that provided support, saying it was an achievement that they had realized together.

While the event was attended by around 5,000 people last year, it was downscaled this time amid a resurgence of the novel coronavirus, with 300 veterans, diplomats, and government figures in attendance.

By Seong Yeon-cheol, Blue House correspondent

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