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The North Korean delegation to a joint festival commemorating the 60th anniversary of the nation's liberation from Japanese colonial rule on Sunday paid homage at the National Cemetery dedicated to the country's freedom fighters and the dead from the 1950-53 Korean War. The government says righting the wrongs of the past begins with mourning those who sacrificed themselves. The occasion marks the first step in a long journey of putting the unhappy past of the two Koreas to rest and making a new start, it says.
The North Korean delegation was rather vague about the significance of the visit. "It's an expression of intent to cast off the old state of affairs and advance toward reconciliation and cooperation in step with the spirit of the times," it said, adding it was an act of homage to those who died for their country¡¯s freedom. Reactions therefore range from interpreting the visit as a symbolic expression of regret for the North's invasion of the South to warnings of an ulterior motive.
If it is to mark the beginning of a genuine healing of the scars of a fratricidal war, North Korea must follow it up with other practical steps. To begin with, it should lose no time in confirming the fate of surviving prisoners of war and South Korean citizens abducted to the North and repatriate them. We can hold commemorative events until we are blue in the face, but until these issues are resolved the war wounds remain open. Pyongyang should also acknowledge its responsibility for the war and apologize in clearer and more specific language. It is difficult to build a lasting peace if the cause and responsibility for the war are merely swept under the carpet.
In return for paying its respects at the National Cemetery, North Korea may expect visiting South Korean officials to pay homage at the Kumsusan Memorial Palace, where the embalmed remains of Kim Il-sung lie in waxy splendor. If it does, it would devalue the currency of its gesture. Such homage should not be coerced or bought, nor is the last resting place of freedom fighters and soldiers in the same class as the symbol of a personality cult surrounding the man who caused the Korean War.
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