hankyoreh

National Unification Advisory Council (NUAC) Executive Vice Chairperson Jeong Se-hyun and Sejong Institute Chairperson Moon Chung-in discuss Korean Peninsula affairs on Thursday at the NUAC office in Seoul. (Kang Chang-kwang/The Hankyoreh)

The “obstacle” of joint military exercises between South Korea and the US needs to be removed through behind-the-scenes inter-Korean dialogue by no later than June for the results of South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s recent summit with his US counterpart Joe Biden to translate into improved North Korea-US relations and a resumption of the Korean Peninsula peace process, two foreign policy veterans said.

In a conversation with the Hankyoreh on Thursday, National Unification Advisory Council executive vice chairperson Jeong Se-hyun and Sejong Institute chairperson Moon Chung-in said the South Korean government should “pursu[e] Panmunjom [behind-the-scenes] dialogue at the special envoy level with North Korea during the first part of June.”

Jeong, a former Minister of Unification, called on Seoul to take preemptive action with the joint military exercises scheduled for August, saying that “any hope of inter-Korean and North Korea-US relations improving during President Moon Jae-in’s term evaporates if they go ahead.”

Moon Chung-in, a former special presidential advisor for unification, foreign affairs and national security, said Pyongyang needs to provide the Moon administration with an opportunity to take action.

“If the current deadlock without any action by the North persists, it becomes difficult for the [South Korean] government to propose a unilateral suspension of the exercises to the US,” he said.

Commenting on the inclusion of a sentence in the recent summit statement about Biden “express[ing] his support for inter-Korean dialogue, engagement, and cooperation,” the two veterans said this had laid the groundwork for inter-Korean relations to move a step forward, serving as a catalyst for North Korea-US relations.

A window of opportunity has opened up, they said.

But they also called for discussions with Washington to ensure that the statement’s reference to “coordinat[ing] our approaches to the DPRK in lockstep” does not become a constraint on inter-Korean relations like the South Korea-US joint working group.

Remarking on the statement’s first-ever mention of the Taiwan Strait and the public outcry this drew from Beijing, the two veterans said that China would not take any practical actions prejudicial to South Korea.

They added that the South Korean government is going to need to be cautious and work to persuade China going forward, but this is not something to be overly concerned about.

By Lee Je-hoon, staff reporter

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