Group comes as denuclearization efforts of Washington and Seoul are increasingly in conflict
The United States and South Korea have agreed to launch a joint working group to coordinate their North Korea sanctions, a move that reflects Washington’s attempt to bridge the allies’ diverging approaches to denuclearizing the Kim regime, experts said.
“The two governments agreed on establishing a new working group that would further strengthen our close coordination on our diplomacy, on our denuclearization efforts, on sanctions implementations, and inter-Korean cooperation that comply with the United Nations sanctions,” Robert Palladino, the State Department’s deputy spokesperson, said.
“So this is an additional step that we’re taking that Special Representative (Stephen) Biegun and his team will be leading,” Palladino said.
The announcement Tuesday came hours after Biegun returned from Seoul, where he discussed “diplomatic efforts to achieve the final, fully verified denuclearization of North Korea,” Palladino added.
The agreement for a joint working group comes as the denuclearization efforts of Washington and Seoul are increasingly at cross-purposes.
Sanctions pressure
Washington has been keeping sanctions pressure on North Korea as it engages in diplomacy, while Seoul has been prioritizing improving inter-Korean ties through joint economic activities that could violate sanctions, which concerns Washington.
“Obviously, coordination has been a problem this year,” said Douglas Paal, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “The working group reflects concern in the U. S. that [Seoul] is getting too far out in front.… I hope this provides a systematic way to manage differences.”
Robert Manning, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, welcomed the formation of the new working group that he expects would keep inter-Korean activities in balance with the objective of denuclearization.
“I commend the administration on this much-needed initiative,” Manning said. “There have been two separate tracks of diplomacy toward North Korea: North-South reconciliation and cooperation, and U. S.-North Korea denuclearization talks. So this working group is aimed at keeping both sets of negotiations closely linked so that the North-South efforts do not get too far ahead of denuclearization efforts.”
Scott Synder, director of the Program on U. S. Korea Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations, points out that the need for a working group has been “apparent since the Pyongyang summit.”
After signing military agreements aimed at reducing tensions and agreeing to pursue inter-Korean economic projects at the Pyongyang summit in September, Seoul and Pyongyang heightened their calls for sanctions relief.
Synder said Seoul’s “overtures and relaxation of tensions with North Korea should be accompanied by clear communication and effective coordination as related to sanctions.”
Manning criticized South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s initiative in advancing inter-Korean economic ties that counter international sanctions.
“President Moon has begun to bump up against the limits of North-South cooperation that are inconsistent with U. N. Security Council sanctions,” Manning said.
‘There will be limits’
“There will be limits to what the consultative group can achieve,”said Troy Stangarone, senior director of the Korea Economic Institute, unless Washington and Seoul have “a common approach to North Korea that entails an agreed [upon] set of objectives.
