By Tong Kim
As the heads of delegations for the six-party talks meet in Beijing this week to discuss the progress of implementation of the February 13 agreement, all the political parties of South Korea now seem to support a more active engagement with North Korea.
The recent policy shift by the Grand National Party (GNP) from opposition to accommodation of the engagement policy of the Roh Moo-hyun government should not be a surprise to many political analysts. There are several important variables that will impact the outcome of the December 17 presidential election.
Progress of nuclear negotiation would certainly be one variable, which would favor a final single candidate representing the pro-government forces of all factions.
The GNP had until recently maintained a policy of reciprocity of give and take in dealing with North Korea, strongly opposing a unilateral provision of economic aid, while supporting the hard-line approach of the Bush administration.
Last November Bush suddenly dropped his coercive containment policy on the North, which led to the February 13 agreement to the shock of the conservatives in Korea, who are the primary supporters for the GNP.
One conservative commentator wrote, ``we were betrayed by the United States.'' Other conservatives were hoping that Bush's new engagement approach had been only a tactical shift that would be reversed to the familiar policy of pressuring and isolating North Korea.
In early March this year, I was invited to join a couple of other professors in a meeting with Rep. Chung Hyung-keun, the architect of the GNP's new policy of ``reciprocal engagement.'' Rep. Chun Yu-ok, an outspoken critic of the sunshine policy, also attended the meeting.
Contrary to one participant's view, I told them that the Bush administration seemed ready to move toward a negotiated settlement of the nuclear issue by aggressively engaging the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) unless its leader Kim Jong-il ignores the rare opportunity to improve relations with the United States and gain badly needed economic aid from outside. DPRK is the official name of North Korea.
I said this was something that Kim always wanted. I could tell that they did not like what they were hearing.
In addition, I frankly told the GNP representatives, the positive prospects of U.S.-North Korean negotiation would not favor their party, whose presidential contenders enjoy a comfortable lead in opinion polls over their counterparts from the pro-government camp.
I suggested that the GNP would not have to change its policy if it was confident that it could win the December election with the support of the hardcore conservatives alone. I knew this would not be the case.
Chung was also concerned about the possibility of an inter-Korean summit around the August 15 Liberation Day. Although his interest remains in the continuation of inter-Korean cooperation, which has been helpful to his poverty stricken state, I told him that Kim Jong-il's primary interest would not be in meeting with the departing South Korean president.
The North Korean leader's wish is to meet with the U.S. president. Bush is unlikely to meet with him, but he will have little reason to oppose a Roh-Kim meeting, as long as North Korea fulfills its promised nuclear obligations.
Incidentally, a week earlier I also shared a similar view with the GNP's frontrunner Lee Myung-bak in a two-hour meeting that was also attended by four other professors and think tank specialists in the area of diplomacy and security.
At the meeting I found former Seoul Mayor Lee to be quick and adaptive to the shifted U.S. direction of nuclear negotiation. Lee has taken a more progressive stance on North Korea than his rival Park Geun-hye.
Three days after my meeting with Rep. Chung, he announced his party would also support the ``Sunshine Policy.'' Even then his announcement received mixed responses. The pro-government Uri Party, while superficially welcoming the change, said the new policy was crafted by the GNP's political calculation. The North Korean Communist Party's organ Rodong Shinmun reacted, ``it was a suspicious disguise.'' The rightwing conservatives complained, ``while convinced that the North Koreans will never give up their nuclear weapons, why should the GNP give them more than the governing party does.''
Then on July 4, the GNP announced an official version of its new policy on North Korea, dubbed ``a vision of peace on the peninsula,'' which pursues a denuclearized peace mechanism, a common economic community, a cooperative system of communicable visits, a program of cooperative humanitarian aid, and building a human rights community _ all spelled out in detail.
The construct of the shifted policy appears to be an impractical theoretic framework that must have been drawn up by some academics.
Under this policy, the operation of the Gaeseong Industrial Complex and Mt. Geumgang tourism and other economic cooperation would continue without disruption after a transfer of power in Seoul.
Now the GNP would support an inter-Korean summit, which may take place before the election. This is something the GNP would not be able to stop from happening anyway.
In response to criticisms of the GNP's new policy _ including the presidential office's demand for an apology from the GNP for having called for suspending its engagement policy after the nuclear test of last October _ Rep. Chung has stiffened the policy platform by reviving some hard-line features.
This revision was made mainly to placate the conservative GNP supporters. Yet clearly the GNP cannot win the election with the support of the conservatives alone. On the other hand, President Roh and all the pro-government forces, should welcome the GNP's turnaround to a more realistic approach to the issues involving North Korea, even if they look the GNP's political motive with suspicious eyes.
The GNP's new policy should strengthen the president's position in dealing with the North. To reject the GNP's new policy is merely an equally politically calculated reaction that could hurt the viability of its own engagement policy in the long run.
Granted, there is no difference between the political parties in putting their political interest first before the long-term national interest of security and peace.
President Roh seems determined to insure the election of a candidate of his own choice at the end of the day. The pro-government forces are still divided in largely three groups over the question of how they should be united as one party.
Yet it is highly likely for them to ultimately agree on a single candidate who will run against one of the two GNP contenders to be determined in August. It is because they know that will be the only way they will have a chance to win.
In Beijing this week, the six nuclear envoys will tackle the second phase of the denuclearization agreement _ disablement of the Yongbyon nuclear facilities and a comprehensive declaration of all the North Korean nuclear programs, which should include a uranium enrichment program.
Upon verification of the implementation of the initial phase, the negotiators will discuss the holding of a ministerial meeting of the six parties as part of the agreement.
The biggest premise for the six-party talks, as agreed in the joint statement of 2005, is for Pyongyang to give up all its nuclear weapons and programs.
There is a long way to go, but progress will continue as the South Korean presidential election approaches closer. The current direction of U.S.-North Korean negotiations will not change no matter who is elected the next president of South Korea this year or the president of the United States next year.
Tong Kim is former senior interpreter at the U.S. State Department and now a research professor at Korea University and a visiting scholar at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS).