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| President Moon Jae-in speaks on the phone with U.S. President Joe Biden, Feb. 4, at Cheong Wa Dae. Courtesy of Cheong Wa Dae |
By Do Je-hae
Now that President Moon Jae-in has spoken with U.S. President Joe Biden via telephone, the biggest question in Korea's diplomatic community is when the two leaders will meet each other in person.
Following the first talks between the two leaders Feb. 4, the presidential office said they had agreed to get together for a summit as soon as the COVID-19 pandemic was better under control.
But the White House readout on the phone conversation did not mention anything about a summit, although Cheong Wa Dae later explained that Biden expressed a wish to meet in person with Moon. "U.S. President Biden mentioned the importance of a face-to-face conversation," a presidential source said.
Korean leaders in the past visited the U.S. within about 50 days of the inauguration of a new U.S. leader. Therefore, speculation is rising that Seoul will try to arrange a Korea-U.S. summit as soon as possible, particularly given that President Moon's diplomatic priority for the remainder of his presidency will be resuming talks between the U.S. and North Korea to move his "peace process" on the Korean Peninsula forward.
The commitment to resuming U.S.-North Korea talks and improving inter-Korean ties was reaffirmed by foreign minister nominee Chung Eui-yong, who as Moon's first national security advisor oversaw Moon's summitry with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in 2018, starting with the April 27 summit at the inter-Korean border village of Panmunjeom.
"We will direct all diplomatic capacity toward establishing a real foundation for progress on North Korea's denuclearization through an early resumption of talks between the U.S. and North Korea, and will coordinate a strategy with the new U.S. administration," Chung said at the start of a nomination hearing at the National Assembly, Friday. "We will pursue exchanges between the two leaders and high-level officials at an early date in order to build trust and establish policy consensus."
One of the most pressing questions facing Moon's summit diplomacy is whom he will meet with first in person, Biden or China's Xi Jinping, in what is largely regarded as the final year of the South Korean leader's presidency. The first six months are particularly considered crucial, as the current administration will start to lose relevancy once the campaign season officially begins in the latter half of the year ahead of the presidential election in March 2022.
The order of precedence in Moon's exchanges with the U.S. and Chinese leaders has gained keen attention amid the Washington-Beijing strategic competition. Moon's Jan. 26 phone conversation with Xi raised eyebrows as it came before Moon had talked with the new U.S. president. Such a conversation, amid arrangements that were being undertaken for the first Moon-Biden phone talks, has triggered criticism from many diplomatic experts that it went against Korea's diplomatic tradition.
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| U.S. President Joe Biden, left, talked with President Moon Feb. 4 on Korea-U.S. alliance and global cooperation. Chinese President Xi Jinping underlined joint projects for the 30th anniversary of establishment of diplomatic relations during his phone talks with Moon on Jan. 26. Yonhap |
It will most likely be Biden that Moon meets first as prospects still remain unclear for Xi's reciprocal visit to Korea in the first half of the year, even though China has conducted an unusually active diplomatic outreach to Korea despite the pandemic with successive visits of two of China's most senior diplomats to Korea last year ― Yang Jiechi, a member of China's Politburo and the most senior foreign policy adviser to Chinese President Xi Jinping, and State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
Unlike Seoul, the Chinese side did not mention anything about a forthcoming summit with Moon after the Moon-Xi phone talks.
"Seoul has continued to emphasize Xi's visit to Korea, but Beijing has been sending a signal that Seoul needs to take more pro-China steps. Beijing is unlikely to officially declare Xi's visit to Korea without them," Shin Beom-chul, director at the Center for Diplomacy and National Security at the Research Institute for Economy and Society in Seoul, told The Korea Times.
With Biden, a forthcoming event would enable him to meet Moon in person, although in a multilateral setting. Moon has been invited to the G7 summit in the U.K in June and there is likely to be a U.S.-Korea summit on the sidelines of the event.
Seoul is expected to go all out to arrange Moon's visit to Washington for a summit with Biden before then, given the urgency the South Korean leader has often expressed for his peace process since the beginning of the year.
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| U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken listens as U.S. President Joe Biden delivers remarks to State Department staff, Thursday, Feb. 4, in Washington. Biden did not mention North Korea during his first visit to the State Department since taking office. AP-Yonhap |
Moon also wants progress on bilateral issues, such as OPCON transfer. "Moon could be expected to fully endorse the ongoing U.S.-Korean alliance while raising the topic of OPCON, that is, South Korean command of forces in the event of war, and the need not to upset the North with large-scale military exercises and intimidating fly-overs by U.S. bombers and surveillance planes. In that context, he and his aides might hope for such a visit to resolve ongoing problems between the U.S. and South Korea, including difficult protracted negotiations on South Korea's contribution to the cost of maintaining U.S. bases and forces in the country," Donald Kirk, a columnist and Korean Peninsula affairs, told The Korea Times.
However, concerns are rising that Washington is unlikely to be considering a Korea-U.S. summit any time soon as the Biden administration is undertaking a careful review of the North Korea policy of the previous administration. Biden did not mention North Korea during his first visit Feb. 4 to the State Department since taking office.
If an in-person meeting is not feasible due to the pandemic, there is the possibility that the first Moon-Biden summit could take place virtually. President Moon held a first online bilateral summit at Cheong Wa Dae with President Shavkat Mirziyoyev of Uzbekistan, Jan. 28.
