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| This photo, provided by the Democratic Party of Korea, shows former President Moon Jae-in meeting the party's leadership at his private residence in Yangsan, 309 kilometers southeast of Seoul, Aug. 29. Yonhap |
Former President Moon Jae-in called for peace on the Korean Peninsula amid heightened tensions over North Korea's missile launches, including the firing of an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) over Japan early Tuesday.
North Korea fired the IRBM in its first launch of the missile in eight months. The launch, which marked the fifth missile test in just over a week, represented one of the gravest provocations the North has undertaken in years as the missile flew about 4,500 kilometers over Japan before crashing into the Pacific Ocean.
"The situation on the Korean Peninsula is again insecure," Moon wrote on Facebook. "But we need to start again. We are in charge of the fate of the Korean Peninsula."
Moon's remarks came on the 15th anniversary of the Oct. 4 Declaration, in which then South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and then North Korean leader Kim Jong-il promised to cooperate on building trust and working for economic cooperation.
The declaration, which followed a 2007 summit between the two leaders in Pyongyang, was not implemented amid ensuing security tensions between the two Koreas and a change of government in the South.
"The leaders of South and North Korea announced their audacious plan for inter-Korean relations and peaceful prosperity in the Oct. 4 Declaration," Moon said. "Regrettably, the spirit did not pass on to the succeeding government. But the road to peace on the Korean Peninsula and peaceful prosperity is a dream that cannot be given up."
Stressing that the two Koreas should work to restore inter-Korean relations based on "national interest and peace," Moon urged Pyongyang to cease its missile provocations and keep its self-imposed moratorium pledge. (Yonhap)
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