New agenda needed for North Korea

By Bernhard Seliger

Bernhard Seliger

The recent and ongoing tensions on the Korean Peninsula left many observers puzzled with regard to the goals of North Korea.

Regardless if the focus of Kim Jong-un’s raising tensions is the domestic audience, aiming at fostering his leadership, or the international audience, aiming at establishing North Korea as a nuclear state and potentially getting new offers of aid for, it seems quite clear South Korea and the United Staes will not give in to the bullying behavior of the North but coolly reacted to the hysterical antics of its leader.

It was the first trial of Kim Jong-un for President Park Geun-hye and she is entitled to praise for the calm way she laid out her program of security and “trustpolitik,” always leaving the way open for negotiations but not giving in to extortionary demands from the North.

When Park and President Barack Obama meet, North Korea will again be high on the agenda.

The crisis has been mastered for the time being, but has not been resolved. North Korean provocations – and here we have to think of grave incidents like in 2010 – can happen all the time and the crisis will surely recur.

What can the trip of Park then bring? First of all, it is an important confirmation of the alliance of both countries.

Though relations have been good and close in the Lee Myung-bak days, too, this confirmation is necessary, in particular as a sign for China that further backing of North Korea will foster America`s role in East Asia indefinitely.

However, what should be done about North Korea?

There are three important points presidents Park should discuss: First, until now, it always has been North Korea which set the agenda of Northeast Asian politics. Before the new South Korean government was even assembled, North Korea tried to press it (not mentioning the rocket launch during the presidential campaign).

South Korea and the U.S. are in urgent need to develop their own agenda on North Korea, not only reacting to provocations, but setting an agenda for trustpolitik and cooperation behind the backdrop of a close security alliance.

Second, and closely related, offers of South Korea to the North have to be communicated not so much by secret diplomacy, but fully open and in view of the media.

One thing that clearly changed in North Korea in the past decade is that its ability to control flows of information in the country considerably weakened.

Every South Korean or U.S. offer for negotiations, cooperation and also rejection of aggressive behavior, eventually will get back to the citizens of the North, though not always immediately or undistorted.

So, an announcement policy, making offers to North Korea every day, is necessary. Even if these offers will not be taken up by the North, they will inform North Korean citizens about the peaceful intentions of the South and will increase pressure on North Korea to answer in kind.

Finally, the two presidents during their meetings should come to a clear division of labor regarding the potential re-engagement of North Korea.

They should develop a list of projects to kick start inter-Korean relations. These measures could be unilateral, like getting rid of obsolete Cold War regulations, while maintaining and increasing security.

Those measures, South Korea could implement on its own. Other measures should be developed to restart inner-Korean relations, focusing first on trade, not aid (which is much more political and leads to much more opportunistic behavior by the North) and, if involving aid, should rather allow (and maybe fund) private aid instead of involving South Korea itself.

To restart engagement and trustpolitik, a very clear understanding between the US and South Korea is necessary to prevent the strategic behavior of the North so frequently seen in the past.

This is then the quest for the summit meeting: setting a new agenda, announcing to the world and foremost the North Koreans the possibility of re-engagement, and finally, reaching an understanding of potential measures as part of the new trustpolitik.

Dr. Bernhard Seliger is the Seoul resident representative of the Hanns Seidel Foundation.