Lee Myung Bak: ‘NK Implored SK Not to Send Leaflets’

The Dong-a Ilbo reported on the 23rd that
Lee Myung Bak, the former president of South Korea from 2008 to 2013, recently
said that North Korea used to entreat the South Korean government to cease launching anti-Pyongyang leaflets across the border. The South
Korean government responded at the time that the sending of flyers was carried
out by private organizations and the North was completely welcome to send similar flyers to the South. 

When asked about the actual effects produced by these leaflets, Lee replied,I cannot
relate the particulars because they are classified, but I think the North Korean regime is tottering; the North Korean military is occupied with
ferreting out and collecting all flyers.
” 

In regards to inter-Korean relations, Lee broached the Cheonan incident of March 2010, saying, We are trying to forget it as time passes, but that does not at all
help North Korea — it only helps the regime.
He added, We need to stop pampering North
Korea; it will only exacerbate its habits. We need to be more austere.”

Lee went on to state that the North mentions cooperation between the Koreas but that in the end the perpetuation of the regime trumps all else. The
fact that Kim family remains has remained in power for three consecutive generations
dispenses with the need for persuasion–the history of humanity corroborates it [the illegitimacy of the North Korean regime],” he said.

Lee also expressed his thoughts on incumbent President Park
Geun Hye’s
 analogy of the reunification of the Korean Peninsula to a “jackpot.” He asserted the word choice to be suitable for spreading positive perceptions about
reunification but added “r
eunification is unlike a [jackpot] game in that it does not happen
instantaneously. It will require much cooperation, effort, and sacrifice from our citizens.”

In his recently published memoir, The President’s Time, he disclosed the fact that a ranking official from North Koreas State Security Department had visited Seoul in December of 2010, a
month after North Korea shelled Yeonpyeong Island, a South Korean territory
located in the Yellow Sea. Lee also unveiled anecdotes from the inter-Korean
summit meetings that took place during his presidency.

He also laid bare the fact that North Korea
requested 500,000 tons of rice from the South in return for its apologies over
sinking Cheonan, a South Korean navy ship, and that North Korea solicited 10
trillion USD for sending representatives to condole with South Korea for
the death of Kim Dae Jung [former South Korean president from 1998 to 2003] in August of 2008 and hosting an inter-Korean summit meeting.