International morality needs to prevail over animosity

By Heo Mane

The international community is often shrouded in more animosity than international morality. International morality has withered to a greater degree, due to the intensified animosity in many corners of the world. So the good has been often shadowed by the bad on the international stage struggling for more power and prestige.

The international community is easily depicted as a world of evil rather than that of good. Humanity has so far lived amid confrontations between the good and bad that does not end in the long processes of struggle for power and prestige.

Pyongyang-Washington relations and Seoul-Pyongyang ties are cases in point because the planned summit between Trump and Kim was abruptly cancelled by the former's change of mind.

The cancellation resulted from war-like rhetoric of North Korea's First Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan and Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui. The harsh rhetoric showed that in a practical sense, the North lacks international morality and even responsibility for the summit talks.

Animosity ― a long-accumulated hatred ― prevails over a moral sense to maintain peace and stability around the world that can help prevent the Korean Peninsula from coming closer to a nuclear confrontation. All Koreans ― both from the South and the North ― do not want to see Armageddon taking place on the peninsula. Once it happens here, a nuclear war will most likely be staged here.

The Trump administration has long desired to carry out a complete denuclearization of North Korea by applying the Libyan model, through which the U.S. can remove all nuclear weapons, fissile materials and ICBMs from the North, with its nuclear scientists banned from engaging in research and development.

This demand is characterized as a speedy comprehensive deal, while Pyongyang may try to protect its regime and people with a small number of nuclear weapons at hand even after the Pyongyang-Washington summit ends.

Pyongyang has repeatedly hinted at step-by-step and reciprocal denuclearization particularly after the second summit between Kim Jong-un with Xi Jinping. Pyongyang has thus declined to accept the Libya model that may threaten its regime and people. The Libyan regime collapsed eight years after it concluded a denuclearization pact with the U.S.

Moammar Gadhafi was ousted from power in the wake of the fall of Tripoli by rebels in August 2011 amid the Arab Spring. You should clearly know that his collapse did not result from denuclearization but from a popular uprising.

Both Pyongyang and Washington should have respected international morality rather than seeking to gain the upper hand in negotiations. Denuclearization is not a matter of both parties alone. It is closely linked to peace and stability on the peninsula and Northeast Asia.

Nuclear weapons and missiles are classified as weapons of mass destruction (WMD). We must not forget the history that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed 129,000 people in a moment, most of whom were innocent civilians including children and the elderly.

The bombings destroyed 70 percent of the two Japanese cities in 1945 to end World War II. Viewed from this historic tragedy, North Korea must commit to a complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization (CVID) and Pyongyang's security should thus be secured. This formula is a compelling demand.

Pyongyang has kept its promise to demolish its Punggye-ri nuclear test site May 24 in the presence of some 20 journalists invited but without nuclear experts. The blasts, however, showed a minimum degree of sincerity.

On the other hand, there is growing skepticism over whether the blasts destroyed the innermost parts of all the tunnels at the Punggye-ri site. Journalists watched the event standing on an observatory tower 35 meters away from the site. The lack of nuclear experts raised doubts about the genuine intention of the event.

Animosity pursuing a higher position may derail the Washington-Pyongyang summit, which was revived after Trump decided to cancel it last week. International morality needs to prevail over animosity to open a new era of peace, stability and co-prosperity.

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence warned that Kim Jong-un would not play President Donald Trump at the Singapore summit. It would be a great mistake for Kim to think he could play Trump. He clearly warned that Trump would walk away from the meeting.

In the meantime, President Moon Jae-in held his latest tete-a-tete meeting with Trump in Washington to tone down the words of his advisers to make a successful summit with Kim and to persuade Trump to keep his first stance unchanged.

Moon held his second summit with Kim at Tongilgak on the North's side of the truce village of Panmunjeom. The meeting certainly helped Moon mediate as a peacemaker to get the Singapore summit back on track.

Pyongyang's brinkmanship tactics, which was apparently aimed at securing a higher position in talks with Washington, can no longer work at this critical juncture. Animosity will only increase tension and overshadow the prospects for peace not only on the peninsula, but also across the globe.

Promoting international morality based on the respect of life is pivotal to building trust and confidence between the U.S. and North Korea. The more international morality prevails in the international community, the more trust and confidence it will foster.

Heo Mane (mane398@naver.com) is a professor emeritus and adviser of the Korea-EU Forum.