Mount Geumgang tour project marks 10-year anniversary

Posted on : 2008-11-18 13:30 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
Symbolic occasion passes amid doubts about the future of the project and inter-Korean relations
 through which tourists to Mount Geumgang must pass before entering North Korea
through which tourists to Mount Geumgang must pass before entering North Korea

On November 18, 1998, the deluxe cruise ship Kumgang departed from the South Korean port of Donghae and set sail for the first cruise to Mount Geumgang (Kumgang), on North Korea’s eastern coast. After some 50 years of separation, exchanges between the South and the North had been initiated. A decade later, the tourism project to Mount Geumgang has reached a milestone in inter-Korean relations, despite the ups and downs. However, the project is currently facing a more tremendous challenge than ever.

The Mount Geumgang tour program was one of the most prominent byproducts of the South’s sunshine policy of engagement with the North. In June 1998, the late Chung Ju-yung, who was at the time Hyundai Group’s honorary chairman, went to North Korea, leading some 500 heads of cattle across the Military Demarcation Line. Chung and North Korea’s National Defense Commission Chairman Kim Jong-il agreed on the tourism project with support from the administration of former President Kim Dae-jung.

The Mount Geumgang project was once a pillar of peace on the Korean Peninsula. The road to Mount Geumgang was not severed in spite of clashes between the two navies in the Yellow Sea in 1999 and 2002 and North Korea’s nuclear test in October 2006. As a basis for trust for inter-Korean relations, the project prevented small-scale scuffles from developing into full-scale conflicts and proved it was possible to make a business of peace.

The project was suspended for various periods: when South Korean tourist Min Young-mi was detained at the resort site in June 1999, when Typhoon Rusa ravaged the Korean Peninsula in 2002 and when the deadly SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) virus broke out in China. Tours were halted for a week in August 2003, when Hyundai Asan Chairman Chung Mong-hun, who had taken the Mount Geumgang project over to carry on his father’s plans, committed suicide amid a probe into allegations that the company might send money to North Korea.

Hyundai Asan, the operator of the Mount Geumgang tour, often ran into trouble amid a political scuffle over allegations that North Korea might divert revenue from the tour to develop nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, step by step, the Mount Geumgang tour project went forward. In the beginning, Hyundai Asan eroded most of its capital because the project was not profitable. However, profitability improved after North Korea designated the resort as a special tourism zone in 2002 and opened a road to the mountain in 2003. Prospects for the sustainability of the tour project increased again in 2003 after North Korea agreed to a deal under which it would receive funding for the tour in the form of US$50 per tourist, rather than as a lump sum. In its first four years of operations, the tour drew some 500,000 tourists and surpassed one million on June 7, 2005. By July 11 of this year, the tour had drawn a total of 1.95 million people. Hyundai Asan, meanwhile, has thus far paid a total of some $480 million to the North, providing it with an important source of hard currency.

In a sudden turn of events, the road to Mount Geumgang became blocked again on July 11, when a South Korean tourist was shot dead by North Korean soldiers while vacationing at the resort site. This led to a suspension of tours. Now, some four months after the suspension, the financial losses incurred by Hyundai Asan, its subcontractors and businesspeople in the nearby Goseong area are estimated to be up to 100 billion won ($70.3 million), according to Kim Young-yoon, a senior researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification. In the days after the shooting occurred, South and North were at odds over whether a fact-finding investigation could be conducted, and how, and failed to resolve the dispute, leading the tours to be discontinued. Since then, prospects for the Mount Geumgang tour project have been clouded by speculation that North Korean leader Kim Jong-il was ill, disputes over anti-North Korean leaflets sent by South Korean activists and the a proposal by South Korea for a U.N. resolution on the North’s human rights situation.

In a policy debate marking the 10th anniversary of the Mount Geumgang tour project on November 17, Jeong Young-cheol, the head of the Research Institute for Contemporary History, said the South Korean government should express its will to respect and implement the June 15 and October 4 Declarations in the direction of resuming (inter-Korean exchanges) first and improving (inter-Korean ties) later. “Specifically, the government needs to resume the Mount Geumgang tour project, resolve the issue of anti-North Korean leaflets and provide support for the Gaeseong (Kaesong) Industrial Complex, including a dormitory,” Jeong said.

In the days after the shooting death at Mount Geumgang, there was the possibility that the two Koreas could have made concessions, because the issue was separate from inter-Korean relations as a whole, Jeong said, but because the issues have become intertwined, there should be countermeasures based on a broad framework for future operations.

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