hankyoreh

June 27.

By Kang Tae-ho, senior staff writer

On June 27, North Korea strongly expressed its opposition to the unauthorized disclosure of the classified transcript from the 2007 inter-Korean summit by the South Korean National Intelligence Service (NIS) and the Saenuri Party (NFP), calling it a “mockery of our supreme leader.” This was three days after the transcripts were released in June 24.

The spokesperson for the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland (CPRF), the North organization for dealing with the South, released an emergency statement early in the morning of June 26, the Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. According to the KCNA, the statement read, “The puppet conservative lackeys’ arbitrary decision to release the transcript of the summit between the two leaders without receiving permission from North Korea constitutes a mockery of our supreme leader and a grave provocation to the other party in the talks.”

With North Korea offering harsh criticism of the release of the transcript, it is becoming less likely that the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), which is attended by the foreign ministers of the members of the six-party talks (North Korea, South Korea, the US, China, Russia, and Japan), will be an opportunity for new talks. The conflict between North and South is keeping the situation on the Korean peninsula from progressing.

“It is obvious that this transcript could not have been released without the direct permission of the current authority in the Blue House,” the CPRF emergency statement said, according to the KCNA. “Considering that the current administration was directly involved not only with the National Intelligence Service’s interference in the election but also in the release of the transcript, it goes without saying that the Blue House was behind it.”

“If they are going to make an issue of being ‘pro-North Korean’,” no one who has visited Pyongyang so far would be free of that label,“ the statement also said. This appears to suggest that, based on the current logic of the ruling party, the behavior of Park Geun-hye and other Saenuri figures who visited North Korea in May 2002 would also drag them into the pro-North Korea controversy.

The statement also addressed the controversy about abandoning the Northern Limit Line (NLL). "The Oct. 4 statement offered a reasonable and peaceful solution to the issue of maritime borders in the West Sea. If that statement had been implemented in good faith, we would not have the problems that we are facing today."

An official at the Ministry of Unification spoke with reporters about Pyongyang’s comments on the same day. "We view the CPRF’s hackneyed threats with regret, but we have decided not to issue an official statement," the official said. The Ministry did not take an official position on this despite the fact that Pyongyang had criticized South Korea for violating the practice of keeping the content of inter-Korean talks classified. It was also reported that the NIS had not held any deliberations with the Ministry of Unification before making the transcript public.

Observers expect that no contact will be made between the foreign ministers of South Korea, the US and North Korea at the ASEAN Regional Forum, which is being held in Brunei from June 30 to July 2. This had been viewed as an opportunity to make some progress in inter-Korean relations and between the North and the US.

When asked by reporters whether there were any plans to make contact with North Korea, South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Cho Tae-young and US Department of State deputy spokesperson Patrick Ventrell said that they did not know anything about it and that they were not reviewing that option, suggesting the governments take a negative view about the possibility.

The position of the US in particular is that it will wait until inter-Korean talks take place before making contact with North Korea. As a result, it looks likely that the controversy brought about by the release of the summit transcript will throw a major wrench in the diplomatic arrangements of countries in Northeast Asia who are trying to restart the six-party talks.

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