Ex-unification minister publishes autobiography, recalls inter-Korean relations

By Yi Whan-woo

The cover of former Unification Minister Park Jae-kyu's autobiography

Former Unification Minister Park Jae-kyu, now president of Kyungnam University, has published an autobiography that details his work for inter-Korean reconciliation over the past 45 years.

The book, with a roughly translated title of “A Whole Heart: The Road to Peaceful Unification,” lists his efforts to bolster cross-border dialogue before, during and after he served as unification minister under the government of President Kim Dae-jung (1998-2003).

“Concern over North Korea’s advancement in nuclear and ballistic missile programs weighs heavily on my mind as we went through the Lost Decade,” he said in a press release, referring to the frayed ties between Seoul and Pyongyang from 2008 to May under the conservative governments of Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye.

“As I did for the past 45 years, I’ll take it as my duty and strike for it for rest of my life, if there is anything I can do regarding the improvement of inter-Korean ties and also helping build a road toward peaceful unification” he said.

The book begins with Park’s academic career before being appointed as unification minister in 1999.

It explains how Park, as a scholar, became interested in North Korea-related issues and helped establish the Institute for Far Eastern Studies, a think tank at Kyungnam University on regional security affairs, in September 1972.

He pioneered raising academic interest in North Korea and unification by running relevant international seminars, seeking academic exchanges with China and the Soviet Union; and setting up South Korea’s first graduate school of North Korea Studies in 1997.

He even visited North Korea with the government’s approval and sought academic exchanges with Kim Il-sung University and Kim Chaek University of Technology in Pyongyang.

As unification minister, Park laid out groundwork for the first inter-Korean summit in June 2000 between then-President Kim Dae-jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.

The summit was preceded by high-level talks between Park and Kim Yong-nam, the President of the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly.

When he accompanied Kim Dae-jung during the summit, Park had in-depth talks with relevant Pyongyang officials on the inter-Korean tour project at Mount Geumgang, reunions of separated families and the railway disconnected by the demilitarized zone.

He continued with inter-Korean reconciliatory efforts even after he quit as minister.

Park visited Pyongyang in 2002 when the KBS Symphony Orchestra performed there, joined the Seoul delegation during the joint ceremony with North Korea for the fifth anniversary of the first inter-Korean summit, and helped run an international symposium in 2006 at the joint industrial park in Gaeseong, North Korea.

To help readers better understand his work, the book contains photographs of Park and his activities.