Asia-Pacific

ROK leader proposes liaison offices with DPRK

(China Daily)
Updated: 2010-01-05 09:11

SEOUL: The president of the Republic of Korea (ROK) proposed yesterday that his country and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) each set up a liaison office in the other's capital to break the impasse in their strained relations and facilitate dialogue between the rival states, an official said.

President Lee Myung-bak's overture came days after the DPRK said in its New Year's message that it was committed to improving ties with the ROK. The positive messages from both sides suggest their relationship could move forward after two tension-filled years.

"We have to come up with a new turning point in South-North relations," Lee said in his nationally televised New Year's address. "I urge North Korea to return to" stalled international nuclear disarmament talks to help "open the floodgate in inter-Korean cooperation," he said.

Lee proposed that the two Koreas establish a standing dialogue channel through which they can talk at any time. He did not elaborate, but spokeswoman Kim Eun-hye said the suggestion was in line with Lee's 2008 proposal that the sides set up liaison offices in Seoul and Pyongyang.

The DPRK had rejected the 2008 offer to set up liaison offices. But its reaction to the latest proposal could be different because the country has significantly softened its hard-line stance toward Lee and called for better ties with the ROK.

In its New Year's message Friday, the DPRK said its commitment to improved relations with Seoul remained "unshakable."

The Tokyo-based Choson Sinbo newspaper, considered to represent the position of the DPRK government, said later Friday that Pyongyang's message suggested there could be a "dramatic event" between the two Koreas. That led media in the ROK to speculate that there could be a summit this year between Lee and DPRK leader Kim Jong-il.

Local news reports have said the two sides held a series of secret meetings last year to discuss a possible summit, but failed to reach agreement because they were wide apart over conditions for such a meeting.

Relations between Seoul and Pyongyang worsened after Lee took office in early 2008 with a pledge to get tough with the DPRK. In response, Pyongyang suspended reconciliation talks and most joint projects.

But the DPRK has tried to reach out to Seoul since last summer in an about-face that analysts and officials say shows the DPRK feels the pain of UN sanctions adopted to punish it for its nuclear test in May.

The two Koreas technically remain at war since the Korean War ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.