South Korea’s preparations for its first summit with North Korea in more than a decade are in full swing this week, officials said on Sunday, a day after the North’s pledge to end its nuclear tests raised hopes but also scepticism.
North Korea said on Saturday it was suspending nuclear and missile tests and scrapping its nuclear test site, and instead pursuing economic growth and peace ahead of planned summits with South Korea and the United States.
The announcement was welcomed by leaders around the world including US president Donald Trump.
But some have expressed doubts about the North’s intentions, and South Korean president Moon Jae-in will be under intense international scrutiny when he meets North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Friday.
“North Korea has a long history of raising the issue of denuclearisation and has committed to freeze its nuclear weapons programmes in the past. We all remember how those pledges and commitments went down over past decades,” said Nam Sung-wook, a professor of North Korean studies at Korea University in Seoul.
“Although the North’s announcement is quite dramatic, it’s natural for the world to be extra sensitive to every word spoken by Kim.”
Nuclear arsenal
Kim’s announcement did not include a commitment to scrap existing nuclear weapons and missiles, and there are doubts he would ever give up the nuclear arsenal his country has been developing for decades.
Kim said North Korea no longer needed to test nuclear bombs or intercontinental ballistic missiles now that his country had the weapons, and he would gear all efforts toward economic development.
Moon, who welcomed Kim’s announcement as a “major” step toward denuclearisation, is making the summit his sole focus this week, staying in the presidential Blue House to prepare, with no outside engagements, a Blue House official said on Sunday.
South Korea’s presidential security service met officials from the military as well as the UN Command on Saturday to discuss security at the border truce village of Panmunjom, where the inter-Korean summit will take place, the official said.
Peace House
For the past few weeks, South Korea has been renovating Peace House, on its side of Panmunjom, to prepare for the summit with Kim, who will be the first North Korean leader to set foot in the south since the 1950-1953 Korean War.
On Monday, the two Koreas will hold another round of working-level talks at the Tongil Pavilion on the North Korean side of Panmunjom to discuss protocol, security and media coverage of the summit.
Moon now has a direct phone link with Kim on his office desk, instead of having to communicate through a hotline at the Joint Security Area in Panmunjom, which had been the main channel between the two sides over the Winter Olympics in February.
The two leaders are expected to talk over the newly installed phone for the first time this week, before the summit, South Korea said on Friday.