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Former President Roh Tae-woo disclosed that the announcement of the joint declaration of denuclearization was a pre-emptive move intended to put the provocative North under control.
In his memoir released this week, Roh, 80, recalled he was motivated to push for the joint statement shortly after learning in 1991 that the United States was going to withdraw its tactical nuclear weapons deployed in South Korea.
“I thought we needed to do something to prevent North Korea from going for a nuclear program, and take the initiative in denuclearization on the Korean peninsula,” the former president said regarding the reason of pushing for the joint statement with the North.
He came up with the idea after Kim Jong-hui, then senior presidential secretary for foreign affairs and security, reported to him that Washington was likely to withdraw its tactical nuclear weapons from South Korea.
Several nuclear warheads had been deployed in Korea for reportedly 33 years, beginning in 1958. All of them were removed in 1991.
On Dec. 31, 1991, prime ministers of South and North Korea signed the Joint Declaration for the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
Under the six-point action-oriented initiative, the two sides agreed not to “test, manufacture, produce, receive, possess, store, deploy or use nuclear weapons.”
They also agreed not to possess nuclear reprocessing and uranium enrichment facilities.
But later, the North violated the declaration when it tested plutonium-based nuclear weapons in 2006 and 2009, and disclosed its enriched uranium program to a visiting U.S. scientist last year.
Roh disclosed he gave 300 billion won to then ruling party presidential candidate Kim Young-sam ahead of the presidential elections in 1992.
He also revealed stories on inter-Korean relations that remained confidential.
Roh said he was invited to visit North Korea in 1992. A North Korean envoy who visited Seoul in spring 1992 delivered the invitation on behalf of then North Korean leader Kim Il-sung.
Roh turned it down after being informed by his aide that the timing of his visit would coincide with Kim’s birthday, and that South Korea might have to offer cash to the North for inter-Korean talks to take place.
Roh said at that time he didn’t feel the need to sit down with the North Korean leader if holding inter-Korean talks requires him to pay.
