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Inter-Korean vice-ministerial talks will be held Monday and Tuesday in the North Korean border city of Kaesong. It has been 10 months since the North stalled meetings under the pretext that Seoul did not permit South Korean citizens to attend events commemorating the 10th anniversary of the death of Kim Il-sung.
Its urgent need for fertilizer should have prompted the North to keep the inter-Korean talks going. When Pyongyang requested 500,000 tons of fertilizer, Seoul made it clear that there must first be talks between the two sides. Reports have it that the North recently asked China for fertilizer aid too, only to be rejected on account of the nuclear dispute. The North now faces an emergency because it needs fertilizer in the sowing season.
With regard to the nuclear issue, too, Pyongyang should have seen the advantage of talking to Seoul, which has now started to see things in a new way after a series of provocations from the North like its declaration that it has nuclear weapons, its test-firing of a missile, and the spent fuel rods it says it has harvested from a reactor for reprocessing.
It would therefore have been in North Korea¡¯s best interest to maintain a semblance of regular talks in efforts to keep Seoul and public opinion from tilting toward pressures against it. North Korea has regularly come running to inter-Korean talks when it found itself in a tight spot in the international community, and this time, too, it is hoping to secure an advantage while using the talks as a shield against international pressure.
That being North Korea¡¯s position, our government should be firmer on principles than ever before at the talks. It would be a shame if all they succeeded in doing was secure Pyongyang some fertilizer but failed to gain any results in the nuclear standoff. The talks should indeed become an occasion "when we turn red in the face with anger when we have to¡± even with North Korea, as the president put it.
The government must tell the North in no uncertain terms that there is no room for inter-Korean cooperation while it has nuclear weapons. More than anything else, Seoul must tell Pyongyang that economic cooperation and economic aid are impossible so long as the North continues its nuclear adventure. The government must relinquish its silly idea of playing a sort of broker in the nuclear dispute through the window of its dialogue with the North.
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