Seoul's mediator role to become more important

By Kang Seung-woo

With former Vice President Joe Biden elected the 46th president of the United States, it remains to be seen how South Korea can do its part as a mediator between North Korea and the U.S. in denuclearization talks.

On Saturday (local time), the Democrat unseated incumbent President Donald Trump after crossing the winning threshold of 270 Electoral College votes with a win in Pennsylvania.

There has been speculation that if Biden wins, President Moon Jae-in would see his role of mediating or facilitating nuclear negotiations between the North and the U.S. diminish given that Biden prefers a bottom-up approach with the Stalinist country, unlike President Donald Trump's unorthodox top-down diplomacy that seeks to strike a nuclear deal in a swift and comprehensive manner. Recently, Biden said he will keep pressing the North toward denuclearization through “principled diplomacy.”

Consequently, Moon's Korean Peninsula peace process is expected to hit a snag.

American diplomatic experts advise that Seoul push forward when it has the opportunity to act given that Washington and Pyongyang are going through various ongoing internal challenges.

“With the U.S. political system in utter disarray and over 120,000 cases of coronavirus per day hitting America, it would be natural for Washington to make any Korean issues wait until there is some sense of calm ― ensuring that the North Korean nuclear issue won't get any attention until next year,” said Harry Kazianis, a senior director at the Center for the National Interest.

“With Pyongyang clearly struggling thanks to its own countless internal challenges, President Moon must push forward regardless, and be ready to strike when there is an opening.”

He added: “I would argue he should build on his idea of ending the Korean War through a non-binding political declaration and craft a clear roadmap towards a sustained peace on the peninsula.”

Van Jackson, a professor of Victoria University of Wellington and former Pentagon official, expressed a similar view.

“To be honest, the United States is going to be very distracted ― coronavirus, a new great depression and right-wing militias challenging the legitimacy of the presidency. It's all too much,” he said.

“So South Korea will have an opportunity to exercise some entrepreneurialism; it will just have to watch out for Congress, which has a very classical hardline view of North Korea.”

On the other hand, local experts said the South needs to narrow difference with the U.S. on issues regarding the North and coordinate on them before Biden fully sets up his foreign policy team, which is expected to take at least six months.

“There would be less room for President Moon's role as a mediator or facilitator in the North-U.S. nuclear negotiations,” said Park Won-gon, a professor of international politics at Handong Global University.

“However, it is important for South Korea to be on the same page with the U.S. on the North Korea policy. Apparently, there are differences between the allies on how to deal with the North, and the South Korean government needs to resolve these differences.”

Kim Jung, professor at the University of North Korean Studies, also said the Moon administration needs to accept the new U.S. administration's bottom-up approach and dissuade the North from staging military provocations in protest of the U.S.' new policy toward the reclusive country.

“The problem is North Korea's possible resistance and the South Korean government needs to control the protest and stop the North's possible provocative actions in the early stages of the Biden administration,” Kim said.

The North has historically conducted strong provocations in the first year of a U.S. administration to capture U.S. attention. Given that it showcased a new intercontinental ballistic missile last month, the Kim Jong-un regime is anticipated to test-fire the missile in early 2021.

The political watchers warned that if the Moon administration sticks to a top-down approach, the allies may run into conflict.

“Should the South Korean government continue pushing for a declaration to end the Korean War or a summit between the U.S. and the North, the allies will have troubles in bilateral relations,” Park said.

“The Biden camp has a wide spectrum of personnel on the North Korea issue and they are reviewing various options. We need to make efforts to turn them to our advantage.”

Kazianis also said, “Our greatest mistake is trying to tackle the hardest issue when it comes to North Korea first ― dooming the process to failure. That is like trying to get a baby to climb a mountain when it is just learning to crawl. If we can adjust the order of what we hope to achieve, we can reach for a sustainable peace that has a solid foundation. Anything else would be a mistake.”

The South Korean government is now exploring measures to keep its Korean Peninsula peace process intact even if the new U.S. administration is inaugurated.

On Thursday, the presidential office held a National Security Council meeting to discuss the results of the election and its effects. Cheong Wa Dae said the South Korean government will work with the U.S. on the basis of the robust South Korea-U.S. alliance to ensure no gaps in its efforts to develop bilateral relations and advance the Korean Peninsula peace process.

Unification Minister Lee In-young acknowledged, Friday, that North Korea policy has lost consistency in the past whenever a new administration was launched in South Korea or the U.S. “This time we'll continue the peace process without fail,” he said in a forum in Seoul. “We'll keep the stance that South Korea and the U.S. need to seek consistent North Korea policy toward a peaceful resolution, and will deliver that stance to the next U.S. administration when we have chance, so the two countries can have a close cooperative system starting from inauguration.”

However, the experts believe Moon's peace efforts will not see much progress.

“There are constituencies in the U.S. ― including in Congress ― who support a peace process. The bigger impediment is North Korea, and as everyone knows, North Korea's willingness to take a peace process seriously depends on sanctions relief and them being permitted to retain nuclear weapons. Those are the real sticking points,” Jackson said.

Kim also said, “There would be no big changes as the U.S. will stick to a more cautious tone, which would anger the North. The fate of the peace process depends on the North's response ― going back to square one or remaining in talks with the U.S.”