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Kim Young-ho, Yoon’s pick to run the Ministry of Unification, speaks to the press outside his office for preparing for his appointment hearing at the National Assembly in Seoul on June 29. (Yonhap)

On Thursday, President Yoon Suk-yeol nominated outsiders to the two top positions within South Korea’s Ministry of Unification. Kim Young-ho, a professor of political science and diplomacy at Sungshin Women’s University, will replace the current unification minister, while Seoul’s current ambassador to Thailand will serve as vice minister.

The last time outside figures filled both the unification minister and the vice unification minister roles was 25 years ago, when Kwon O-kie and Kim Suk-woo served as unification minister and vice unification minister, respectively, during the Kim Young-sam administration.

Notably, as Kim Young-ho is a hard-liner on North Korea who has argued for the overthrow of the Kim Jong-un regime and has stressed that South Korea should arm itself with its own nuclear weapons time and time again, critics point out that his appointment dulls the value and meaning of the unification ministry, which should carry out unification policies aimed at North Korea.

Kim has demonstrated a hostile view of North Korea through his writings for news outlets and on YouTube, maintaining that South Korea should go nuclear and bring in US tactical nuclear weapons to the Korean Peninsula.

Writing for the online media outlet PenNMike on April 18, 2019, he argued that “the path to unification will open up only when the political system of South and North Korea becomes one, the Kim Jong-un regime having been overthrown and North Korea having been liberalized.” Writing for the same outlet on Sept. 13, 2018, he asserted that relations between South and North Korea are “hostile.”

On a YouTube video posted on Feb. 20 this year, he contended that US tactical nuclear weapons should be redeployed to the Korean Peninsula, arguing that “the time has come for the US to actively consider redeploying tactical nuclear weapons to South Korea and for South Korea to strongly make such demands to the US.”

Kim Young-ho’s claim that the road to unification should be opened by “overthrowing the Kim Jong-un regime” due to the fact that relations between the two Koreas are “hostile” can be summed up as a position advocating for coercive unification through absorption. This runs counter to the Yoon administration’s official stance against pursuing unification through absorption.

The argument for the redeployment of tactical nuclear weapons also runs counter to the government’s position. During last October’s parliamentary inspection at the National Assembly, regarding the possible redeployment of tactical nuclear weapons championed by some members of the ruling camp, Unification Minister Kwon Young-se said, “That is not the government’s position. I do not agree.”

In addition to appointing a vocal hard-liner on North Korea as unification minister, Yoon tapped Moon Seoung-hyun, a veteran diplomat who previously served as minister of state affairs at the South Korean Embassy in the US, as vice unification minister.

Some are interpreting this move as a sign that Yoon means to entirely reshape the function and nature of the Unification Ministry. Rather than leading inter-Korean dialogue and exchange as it has done up until now, critics argue, the ministry may direct its focus on pressuring North Korea by bringing attention to the human rights problem in North Korea together with the international community.

This goes hand in hand with Yoon’s appointment of Hanshin University social welfare professor Kim Soo-kyung, who has researched human rights issues in Korea and abroad, as his unification secretary as well.

Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korea Studies, commented that Thursday’s personnel appointments “signal the launch of a ‘ministry of confrontation’ or a ‘ministry of North Korean absorption’ that aims to unify [Korea] through absorption via antagonism and confrontation rather than a unification ministry seeking peaceful unification through dialogue and cooperation.”

The atmosphere within the ministry as it welcomes outside figures for its two chief positions is uneasy. One official told Yonhap News that “it seems like the unification ministry is being demanded to completely change its organizational identity, such as what it does, its approach, and the mindset of its members.”

After his nomination was announced, Kim Young-ho told reporters that he will “endeavor to build a foundation for solving the North Korean nuclear problem and improving inter-Korean relations with principle.”

When asked if he still believes that unification is possible only when North Korean leadership has been overthrown, he said, “Some outlets reported in that vein, but if you read my writings carefully, you will be able to understand their contextual meanings.”

Additionally, when asked whether he could fulfill the role of carrying out exchange and cooperation as the unification minister as a known hard-liner on North Korea, he said, “I will elaborate on such concerns during the hearing process.”

By Shin Hyeong-cheol, staff reporter

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