South Korea yesterday proposed high-level talks with Pyongyang to be held on Tuesday next week, after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called for better relations and said his nation might attend next month’s Winter Olympics.
Kim used his annual new year address to warn he has a “nuclear button” on his table, but sweetened his remarks by expressing an interest in dialogue and taking part in the Pyeongchang Games in South Korea next month.
South Korean Minister of Unification Cho Myoung-gyon told a news conference that Seoul was “reiterating our willingness to hold talks with the North at any time and place in any form.”
Photo: AP
“The government proposes to hold high-level government talks with North Korea on Jan. 9 at the Peace House in Panmunjom,” Cho said, referring to a truce village on the border. “We hope that the South and North can sit face-to-face and discuss the participation of the North Korean delegation at the Pyeongchang Games, as well as other issues of mutual interest for the improvement of inter-Korean ties.”
“Just the fact that they are meeting will be meaningful, because it signals an attempt on both sides to improve relations,” Dongguk University political science professor Koh Yu-Hwan said.
However, once they sit down, the North could put Seoul in a difficult position by making unacceptable demands such as an end to its annual joint military drills with the US, Koh added.
“What North Korea is trying to do is re-establish its relations as a nuclear state [with Seoul]. The South’s dilemma is whether we can accept that,” Koh said.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who has long favored engagement to ease tensions with the North, earlier yesterday welcomed Kim’s suggestion of an opportunity for dialogue.
However, he indicated that improvements in ties must go hand-in-hand with steps toward denuclearization.
Kim’s comments were the first indication of the North’s willingness to take part in the Games to be held from Feb. 9 to 25.
Moon called them a “positive response” to Seoul’s hopes that the Olympics would be a “groundbreaking opportunity for peace” and urged officials to come up with measures to realize the North’s participation.
Beijing, Pyongyang’s main ally, welcomed developments.
“We support the two sides in taking advantage of this opportunity to make concrete efforts to improve bilateral ties... and realize the denuclearization of the peninsula,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Geng Shuang (耿爽) said.
In his speech, Kim said that the Olympics could provide a reason for officials from the neighbors “to meet in the near future.”
“Since we are compatriots of the same blood as South Koreans, it is natural for us to share their pleasure over the auspicious event and help them,” Kim said.
The main venues for the Games are just 80km from the border with North Korea and the build-up to the event has been overshadowed by the nuclear standoff.
However, Seoul and the Games’ organizers are keen for the North to take part.
Analysts say its participation at Pyeongchang is likely, given Kim’s remarks about sending a delegation there.
Two North Korean athletes — pairs figure skaters Ryom Tae-ok and Kim Ju-sik — qualified for the Games, but Pyongyang’s Olympic Committee missed an Oct. 30 deadline to confirm to the International Skating Union that they would participate.
They could still be invited.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique