President Lee Jae Myung on Thursday underscored that peace and stability must guide Seoul’s inter-Korean policy — and that decades of hostility cannot be erased with a single breakthrough.
Lee’s remarks came after North Korea’s state media reported Thursday that leader Kim Jong-un had defined South Korea as a “thoroughly hostile state” and a “permanent enemy,” while dismissing the Lee administration’s inter-Korean reconciliation policy at the Ninth Party Congress.
“What we must pursue are the values of peace and stability. We must put an end to the past that raced toward confrontation and war,” Lee said during a meeting of senior secretaries and aides at Cheong Wa Dae.
Lee acknowledged, however, that the legacy of inter-Korean hostility cannot be reversed overnight.
“Given the current situation, the confrontational policies that have been pursued while accepting the risk of war — and the resulting mindset of confrontation and hostile sentiment — cannot be eliminated overnight,” Lee said. “That is why corresponding and sustained efforts are required.”
Lee further explained that “long-accumulated hostile sentiment and a confrontational mindset cannot be eliminated in an instant through a single, dramatic measure.”
“Through sustained efforts, we must build trust — and allow that trust to accumulate until it leads to mutual understanding and, ultimately, empathy,” Lee said.
Lee also questioned whether hard-line approaches by previous South Korean governments toward North Korea had produced meaningful results.
“We must seriously reflect on whether the insults or threats directed at North Korea so far have truly contributed to peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula, and whether they have been useful in safeguarding the Republic of Korea’s national interest and security,” Lee said.
Lee underscored that “Inter-Korean relations must also be normalized.”
According to the Korean Central News Agency, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un rebuffed Seoul’s conciliatory approach toward inter-Korean relations while leaving the door open for potential engagement with the United States.
In a report to the Ninth Party Congress held from Feb. 20 to 21, Kim said, “The conciliatory posture outwardly advocated by the current ruling regime of the ROK is a clumsy deception and a shoddy work,” KCNA reported Thursday in a Korean-language dispatch. ROK is the acronym for the Republic of Korea, South Korea’s official name.
KCNA said Kim “pointed out that a final, significant decision had been made to define relations with South Korea as the most hostile state-to-state relations, and declared the immutable principled position of our Party and government.”
dagyumji@heraldcorp.com
