Current Korea

An Unprecedented
Milestone in 2018

A tide of hostility and threats seems to ebb away from the Korean
Peninsula over the past year. The two Koreas now see a tide of hospitality
and compromise flowing in slowly but steadily.

Written by Sohn Ji-ae

President Moon Jae-in (right) and North Korean Chairman Kim Jong Un shake hands in front of the Military Demarcation Line in Panmunjeom, prior to their first summit on April 27, 2018. © Yonhap News

An Extraordinary
Change from Last Year

Soldiers from the two Koreas exchanged cigarettes and chatted at the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that divides the Korean Peninsula, the most heavily armed border in the world.

This rare scene took place at the most unlikely place on Dec. 12 as the two sides were inspecting the dismantlement and disarmament of their rival’s 11 guard posts each along the region. It was part of agreements made by the leaders of the Koreas during the Pyeongyang Inter-Korean Summit in September, 2018

Such scene of South and North Korean soldiers engaging and connecting with each other with their guard down might sound unimaginable in the past. However, the year of 2018 was different. Nuclear weapon and missile tests and dangerous rhetoric about mutual annihilation, like in 2017, shifted to a mood of reciprocity in 2018, with military tensions becoming the lowest since its division.

Military officials from South and North Korea shake hands at the Demilitarized Zone in Cheorwon, Gangwon-do Province, on Dec. 12, 2018. © Ministry of National Defense

A Tide of Tension out,
A Tide of Hope in

The North Korea of 2018 was not the North Korea of the past, when a regime had usually broken so many promises and abruptly walked away from dialogue when things would backfire on them.

2018 was the year when a real progress was made in the inter-Korean ties. The progress kept moving forward, slowly but steadily, and never dragged backward. The driving force behind these steady steps forward was President Moon Jae-in, who had since his inauguration firmly stuck to the policy of resuming dialogue with the North.

President Moon held three inter-Korean summits with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a deed that is seen by many as extraordinary that previous South Korean presidents ever couldn’t achieve.

Following the summits, President Moon and Chairman Kim carried out promises that they had agreed on, step by step and one by one. It’s assumed that more than one third of the promises have been kept: both sides have held high-level talks, set up a joint liaison office, hosted reunion meetings for families separated during the Korean War and ceased all hostilities in air, sea and land, among others.

Also look at the Inter-Korean Railway Project connecting the South’s Gyeongui and the North’s Donghae rail lines and, also, roads. Seemingly a day will soon come when the peoples of the two Koreas can travel to the other neighbor by train and car. This will definitely boost economic integration and cooperation significantly between the two Koreas.

More importantly, the improved inter-Korean relations led to the first-ever historic summit between Chairman Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump in Singapore who warned just one year ago in 2017 that Pyeongyang would be met with “fire and fury like the world has never seen.”

The North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and the U.S. President Trump look at each other and shake hands.

Skepticism Still Exists

Despite all these unprecedented and significant developments that the world saw in awe throughout 2018, many skeptics say that they are still doubtful that Pyeongyang will give up on all nuclear weapons. As the U.S. government continued to argue that the existing sanctions on the North should be put in place and, even worse, it recently imposed new sanctions on three North Korean officials for alleged human rights abuses, tensions between Washington and Pyeongyang are running high again.

Negotiations for a scheduled second summit between Chairman Kim and President Trump seem to be stuck, which ignites concerns that the denuclearization and peace talks will possibly come to a halt as in the past.

However, what’s different from the past—here again—is that there is “a willingness.” The three stakeholders— Seoul, Pyeongyang and Washington—all are willing to meet and talk and willing to “keep the door open.” They all are willing to do things differently from the past. All the development and progress that we saw in 2018 are preludes to what we’ll see in the new year. That could be the next second U.S.-North Korea summit or the North Korean leader’s first-ever trip to the southern neighbor, both now under negotiations.

Hopefully, 2019 becomes the year during which we will see another new milestone unfold in inter-Korean ties and, slow but sure, real progress will be made as in 2018, progress that will lay the critical groundwork for the North’s eventual denuclearization and peace that we’ve long hoped for.