South Korean President Moon Jae-in has called on the United States to move toward the nuclear-armed North’s demands for a declaration the Korean War is ove
SEOUL/WASHINGTON – South Korean President Moon Jae-in has called on the United States to move toward the nuclear-armed North’s demands for a declaration the Korean War is over, as the allies pursue increasingly different approaches towards Pyongyang.
Washington has shied away from a formal announcement that the 1950-53 conflict, when hostilities ceased with an armistice rather than a peace treaty, has ended, saying that the North must first take more steps towards giving up its atomic arsenal.
For its part Pyongyang — which long insisted it needed nuclear weapons to defend itself against a possible U. S. invasion — has pledged only to work toward denuclearization “of the Korean peninsula,” demanding simultaneous moves by Washington in return, with a peace declaration its first priority.
“The North has stopped all nuclear and missile tests, dismantled its only nuclear test site and is now dismantling its missile engine test facilities, and is promising to take steps toward dismantling its Yongbyon nuclear complex if the U. S. takes corresponding measures,” Moon told the BBC on Friday.
“Declaring the end of the war is a political declaration that the U. S. would end decades of hostile relations with the North,” he said.
“Moving toward such a process is the corresponding measure the U. S. should take,” he added, according to a transcript released by the presidential Blue House.
The comments, made ahead of Moon’s departure Saturday for a tour of European capitals, emphasize the increasing differences between Seoul and Washington, which has 28,500 troops stationed in the South to defend it from its neighbor.
Experts say the offers made by the North will have little impact on its military capabilities, and Pyongyang itself has said it has no further need to test its weapons.
But Moon said Kim understood denuclearization meant more than closing testing facilities.
It also included “dismantling facilities that produce nuclear weapons and develop missiles,” he said, “and it includes everything else, such as getting rid of existing nuclear weapons and nuclear materials.”
Pyongyang has made no such declaration in public, and missiles were included in the designs of propaganda posters on display in the capital last month, when it celebrated the 70th anniversary of the foundation of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, as the country is officially known.
