Unification minister seeks Mongolia's support to bring Pyongyang to dialogue

Unification Minister Chung Dong-young, left, shakes hands with Mongolian President Ukhnaa Khurelsukh in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, Thursday. Courtesy of Ministry of Unification

Unification Minister Chung Dong-young has met with Mongolian President Ukhnaa Khurelsukh to discuss deepening bilateral ties and advancing peace on the Korean Peninsula, the ministry said Friday.

Chung is currently in the Mongolian capital for the 11th Ulaanbaatar Dialogue, a forum on security and peace cooperation in Northeast Asia.

In his meeting with the president, Chung said Mongolia, one of the few countries that maintains friendly ties with both Koreas, is uniquely positioned to help advance peace on the peninsula.

He called on Ulaanbaatar to push Pyongyang to rejoin the forum, which North Korea last attended in 2018, and to jointly explore ways to pursue trilateral cooperation among the two Koreas and Mongolia.

Khurelsukh said bilateral relations had entered "a golden era" and expressed firm support for Seoul's peaceful coexistence policy toward the North, according to the ministry.

At the forum's opening session held a day earlier, Chung proposed a four-way dialogue involving South Korea, North Korea, the United States and China to establish a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula.

The two-day forum wraps up later in the day, with Chung set to return home Saturday.