New President of South Korea wants diplomacy with North Korea

A leading Canadian disarmament expert, Ernie Regehr, makes the case for renewed diplomatic engagement with North Korea as the only sure route to eventual denuclearization: What a U.S. missile defence system and a new president mean for South Korea (Ernie Regehr, OpenCanada.org, 11 May 2017).

“While inflammatory rhetoric and military action meant to intimidate have escalated, diplomacy remains restrained to the point of paralysis.”

Yet, as the article expounds, North Korea has sent some positive signals regarding possible negotiations that the U.S.A. has to date failed to build upon, instead taking the highly provocative and likely counterproductive step of deploying the unproven anti-ballistic missile system –THAAD – in South Korea.

“…. [T]here really is only one antidote to the “mystery” of North Korea, and that is engagement….[beginning with] multi-level and multi-forum explorations…. [i]nformal but sustained contacts among officials and experts, academic-level discussions and conferences, citizen-to-citizen engagement….”

The good news is that the newly elected President of South Korea, Moon Jae-in, has signaled his strong desire for a new round of diplomacy, and this is precisely what Canada and other like-minded states should be promoting.

For the full article, click What a U.S. missile defence system and a new president mean for South Korea (Ernie Regehr, Open Canada, 11 May 2017).

See also: A Pivot on the Korean Peninsula (Frank Ching, Globe and Mail, 16 May 2017).

 

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