[Editorial] Transparency in Efforts to Hold North-South Summit

When Unification Minister Chung Dong-young said, “A North-South summit should take place by 2005,” he expressed his willingness to arrange a second summit. All in all, there is no reason to oppose the summit. The first summit in June 2000 greatly contributed to the North-South reconciliation and peace in the Korean Peninsula, despite the controversy. If the North and South’s leaders hold hands again, it will be another giant step away from mutual distrust to mutual trust.

However, for the summit to succeed, it is required to satisfy several principles and preconditions. First, it must not forget that the second summit has been already agreed upon. In the North-South communiqué, Kim Jong-il, the National Defense Committee chair of the North, promised to visit Seoul at an appropriate time. This promise has not been kept for more than four years, and the North is to blame. It is the North that should put efforts into keeping the promise. It’s not we who should be driven by them or have to hustle and bustle. It is needed to clarify with the North that an epoch-making improvement in North-South relations will be unlikely unless the North does not follow through with what’s agreed upon at the previous summit.

Second, efforts for the summit should proceed transparently. Following Chung’s remarks, the Ministry of Unification said, “There is little change in the ministry’s posturing towards a summit.” The government cannot explain away suspicions that it is clandestinely planning for the summit. A majority of the public still vividly remembers that the secret contact by the government for the first summit resulted in a payout of hundreds of millions of dollars to the North.

When it puts efforts into holding the summit in a dignified fashion, the summit will receive public support. The summit must not become a surprise. Haven’t concerns been raised that attempts to repeal the National Security Law are somehow related to efforts to hold the summit?

If North-South dialogue is an urgent matter, the government should try harder to reactivate ministerial talks which the North unilaterally suspended. It should not even dream about using the summit as a way out of the political impasse at home.