Hopes for peace in Korean Peninsula
Attention is rivetted on a mission this week headed by former US president Jimmy Carter to broker peace in the Korean Peninsula. Carter, who belongs to the Elders Group, will be accompanied by three other ex-world leaders — former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, ex-Irish president Mary Robinson and ex-Norwegian prime minister Gro Harlem Brundtland — in the visit to North Korea and South Korea.
Seoul is co-operating with the mission; it is expected to grant the Elders Group permission to fly directly to South Korea after visiting the North Korean capital Pyongyang..
There are no commercial air services across the border between the two Korea, but there have been occasional direct private or military flights.
There are several items on the Elders’ agenda. The first is a broad exploration of possibilities for reviving the six-party talks on North Korea’s controversial nuclear programme. Pyongyang has said it is ready for new talks, but has attached conditions to its participation. It would indeed be a great breakthrough if Carter could convince the North Korean leadership to return to the talks with a sincere intention to solve the dispute once and for all.
Another issue of equal if not more importance if the humanitarian crisis looming in North Korea. UN officials who recently visited the North have reported that more than six million people — a quarter of the population — urgently need food aid.
Pyongyang is in position to meet the need and it definitely requires international assistance. However, the past record of the North Korean regime in this respect is murky; hundreds of thousands of North Koreans have died because of starvation and malnutrition in the past, with Pyongyang doing little to avert the deaths; it suppressed news of the catastrophe and it was not much later that the world knew of the actual dimension of the crisis.
Other items on Carter’s agenda include securing the freedom of a Korean-American imprisoned by the North since last November and facing trial for unspecified crimes. That might not be a problem given that Pyongyang agreed to his request in last August for the release of jailed US citizen Aijalon Mahli Gomes.
Carter is no newcomer to the Korean crisis. In 1994 he mediated with Pyongyang after the United States came close to war with North Korea over its nuclear weapons programme.
The crisis in the Korean Peninsula is a major irritant in regional affairs and a threat to co-operation and development among the countries of the region. The world hopes that the Elders would be able to make a real difference to the limping efforts to solve the problem once and for all.
Seoul is co-operating with the mission; it is expected to grant the Elders Group permission to fly directly to South Korea after visiting the North Korean capital Pyongyang..
There are no commercial air services across the border between the two Korea, but there have been occasional direct private or military flights.
There are several items on the Elders’ agenda. The first is a broad exploration of possibilities for reviving the six-party talks on North Korea’s controversial nuclear programme. Pyongyang has said it is ready for new talks, but has attached conditions to its participation. It would indeed be a great breakthrough if Carter could convince the North Korean leadership to return to the talks with a sincere intention to solve the dispute once and for all.
Another issue of equal if not more importance if the humanitarian crisis looming in North Korea. UN officials who recently visited the North have reported that more than six million people — a quarter of the population — urgently need food aid.
Pyongyang is in position to meet the need and it definitely requires international assistance. However, the past record of the North Korean regime in this respect is murky; hundreds of thousands of North Koreans have died because of starvation and malnutrition in the past, with Pyongyang doing little to avert the deaths; it suppressed news of the catastrophe and it was not much later that the world knew of the actual dimension of the crisis.
Other items on Carter’s agenda include securing the freedom of a Korean-American imprisoned by the North since last November and facing trial for unspecified crimes. That might not be a problem given that Pyongyang agreed to his request in last August for the release of jailed US citizen Aijalon Mahli Gomes.
Carter is no newcomer to the Korean crisis. In 1994 he mediated with Pyongyang after the United States came close to war with North Korea over its nuclear weapons programme.
The crisis in the Korean Peninsula is a major irritant in regional affairs and a threat to co-operation and development among the countries of the region. The world hopes that the Elders would be able to make a real difference to the limping efforts to solve the problem once and for all.
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