It is probably not true. I do not want to believe it is true.<\/p>\n
On the 17th, Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun reported, “The South Korean and the U.S. government will propose the ‘big deal’ of preserving the Kim Jong Il regime in exchange for denuclearization.” The Chosun Ilbo ran a similar story on the morning of the 18th in an article entitled ‘Whipping the North to nuclear abandonment, no ‘carrot.'”<\/p>\n
In the article, a Blue House official was reported as saying, “Moving forward, we will not enter into any negotiations that contain reversible disablement measures such as the February 13th agreement, or a stage-by-stage agreement such as the September 19th Declaration.” Professor Kim Sung Han observed, “This means that a negotiated settlement will be proposed, by which a North Korean ‘Marshall Plan’ along with the future preservation of the regime will be guaranteed in return for the North’s complete abandonment of nuclear weapons, nuclear materials and nuclear facilities. It will move directly onto the main, complete and verifiable abandonment phase.” <\/p>\n
In this vein, the Asahi Shimbun cited several Six-Party Talks sources, reporting, “The U.S. and South Korean governments are reviewing ways to acknowledge the continuation of the current North Korean regime with Kim Jong Il at its center in compensation for nuclear abandonment.” The Shimbun also noted that there is the possibility of grand economic aid and the conversion of the current armistice agreement to a full peace treaty.” <\/p>\n
However, Friday\u2019s Donga Ilbo cited the words of a South Korean government official, “A big deal for North Korean nuclear abandonment has never been discussed between the U.S. and South Korea.” Also, according to a report by the Daily NK on the 18th, “The idea of continuing the Kim Jong Il regime has never even been internally reviewed by the South Korean government.”<\/p>\n
That the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade says that it has not even internally reviewed what Asahi Shimbun claims as future policy leads, for the time being, to a sigh of relief. However, it will not last forever. There is a need for the South Korean government to caution against listening to experts who express erroneous logic masquerading as advice.<\/p>\n
The question is how can stories of a proposed “big deal” abound when it is neither logical nor realistic?<\/p>\n
First, logically, whether or not the Kim Jong Il regime is preserved depends on Kim himself and the North Korean people; it is not a matter for surrounding countries to decide. North Korea is a UN member and an independent state under international law. Subsequently, whether or not the outside world acknowledges the continuation of the North Korean regime is neither here nor there. For instance, no other country has the right to proclaim that they \u2018acknowledge the continuation of the Barack Obama regime.”<\/p>\n
Second, if the U.S. and South Korean governments officially acknowledge the Kim regime in compensation for nuclear abandonment by any possibility, it will symbolize an irreversible act of rebellion against 23 million North Korean citizens. It will surely be a shortcut to swiftly and absolutely destroying the North Korea policy of the Lee Myung Bak administration.<\/p>\n
What the 23 million North Korean citizens want the most right now is to no longer have to worry about survival. In other words, they want the establishment of an open government. In North Korea, the only people who do not want that are Kim Jong Il himself and the minority who have no choice but to share the political destiny of the Kim dynasty. Currently, a majority of North Korean citizens would even embrace war as long as some kind of change were achieved. <\/p>\n
The true way to solve the “four North Korean issues” of nuclear abandonment, economic and political opening, human rights and peaceful unification is first to change the absolute dictatorship in North Korea. If this precondition is not realized, then it will be difficult to resolve the North Korean issue at all. <\/p>\n
Talk of North Korean denuclearization and the Kim Jong Il regime has been heard countless times during the 10-year Sunshine Policy era. But, simply put, it is a sophistry created and disseminated by the pro-Kim Jong Il camp in South Korea and proponents of the Sunshine Policy. The sophistry is no more rational than the statement that eating American beef results in mad-cow disease. Such things are mere words made up by people who have no knowledge of the reality in North Korea and, as a result, get their faces slapped by Kim without so much as realizing it.<\/p>\n
Moving forward, the South Korean government has no reason to make any statements about \u201cpreserving the North Korean regime.\u201d Based on international law, North Korea is an independent state, under South Korean Constitutional Law and North Korea is a region which South Korea has yet to recover after the Korean War.<\/p>\n
Accordingly, the South Korean government only has to continue to use the threat of international cooperation to induce North Korea to abandon its nuclear capabilities, and hold dialogue when necessary. It is also critical for the government to work on ‘track B’ activities aiming to turn the Kim dictatorship into an open government.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It is probably not true. I do not want to believe it is true. On the 17th, Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun reported, “The South Korean and the U.S. government will propose the ‘big deal’ of preserving the Kim Jong Il regime in exchange for denuclearization.” The Chosun Ilbo ran a similar story on the morning […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":165,"featured_media":10015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wikipediapreview_detectlinks":true,"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n