Cheong Wa Dae officially denied Monday that Kim Jong-il proposed an inter-Korean summit with President Lee Myung-bak through his envoys. ``If they had done so, it would have been like seeking wool on an ass," a Presidential aide said.
The official may be right. But it's also clear that the unpredictable North has turned from confrontation to conversation, whether to get out of economic difficulties resulting from international sanctions or out of the strategic need to mend fences with its southern rival in keeping with a budding thaw with the United States. The high-powered northern delegation has expressed unmistakable intention to hold another summit, at unofficial meetings.
Now that President Lee has reiterated he is ready to meet with his North Korean counterpart at any time and any place to discuss any subjects, the third inter-Korean summit should not be so remote a possibility. The problem lies in what Seoul should do if Pyongyang refuses to meet the precondition of making firm commitments to denuclearization.
North Korea has long maintained that nuclear disarmament is an issue to be discussed with Washington, not Seoul, a position that is not totally groundless from Pyongyang's standpoint. If one takes the North's argument that its nuclear weapons are to defend itself from U.S. military threats at face value, it is clear Seoul cannot give what Pyongyang wants in return for its denuclearization, due to the so-called nuclear asymmetry between the Koreas. President Lee and his conservative supporters, however, seem to think any summit without nuclear discussion is literally talks without a nucleus.
True, the North Korean regime reveals hypocrisy by adhering to limit its bilateral partner of nuclear discussion to Washington, despite its perennial propaganda on solving Korean problems between Korean people. Still, if the Lee administration sticks to its ``firm and consistent" denuclearization-first policy, the inter-Korean relationship runs the risk of getting nowhere for the foreseeable future ― until, possibly, the incumbent administration leaves office ― surrendering initiatives on regional issues to others and being reduced to a spectator on its own fate.
Even if Koreas restart by discussing cooperation in areas other than the nuclear arms, President Lee won't have to worry about the South ending up as one-sided giver while getting little in return from the North. If Lee takes up where his predecessors left off, the inter-Korean relationship should not necessarily be unilateral but a reciprocal relationship, as even the impoverished North has enough to give to the South, including abundant land, labor and natural resources.
At stake is how much leverage South Korea can maintain over its northern rival in both normal and emergency situations, especially in competition with the United States and China. The South Korean leadership should be able to see far wider and longer instead of being mired in petty one-upmanship with Pyongyang. The late President Kim Dae-jung was not an emotional nationalist but one of the few politicians who could do this strategic thinking.
Lee and his aides seem to be both embarrassed with the North's sudden peace offensive and somewhat elated that Pyongyang has finally extended its hands first. Seen from a more objective viewpoint, however, Seoul is merely responding to what Washington and Pyongyang do, due mainly to its inflexible, unimaginative policy over the past 18 months. It must change now. Any further delay will lead to a self-imposed isolation.