{"id":2011,"date":"2024-08-17T04:43:47","date_gmt":"2024-08-17T04:43:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/?p=2011"},"modified":"2024-08-17T04:43:47","modified_gmt":"2024-08-17T04:43:47","slug":"south-koreas-yoon-makes-rare-outreach-to-north-koreans-for-unification","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/?p=2011","title":{"rendered":"South Korea\u2019s Yoon makes rare outreach to North Koreans for unification"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON:<\/strong> South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol\u2019s freedom-based approach toward unifying the two Koreas could chart a bold path signaling a departure from the policies of his predecessors, experts in Washington said.<\/p>\n

In a speech commemorating South Korea\u2019s Liberation Day on Thursday, Yoon introduced the\u00a0\u201cAugust 15 Doctrine,\u201d\u00a0his vision for achieving a \u201cfreedom-based unification\u201d of the Korean Peninsula.<\/p>\n

Made up of incremental strategies, the doctrine seeks a dialogue between South and North but puts much weight on addressing the North Korean human rights issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cTestimonials from numerous North Korean defectors show that our radio and TV broadcasts helped make them aware of the false propaganda and instigations emanating from the North Korean regime,\u201d Yoon said during his speech.<\/p>\n

The seven key steps under the doctrine include expanding North Koreans\u2019 rights to access information, supporting endeavors to inform the international community of North Korea\u2019s human rights situation, incorporating the roles of North Korean defectors into unification efforts, and providing humanitarian aid to North Korea.<\/p>\n

Accent on rights<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sung-Yoon Lee, a fellow with the Wilson Center\u2019s Indo-Pacific Program, said Yoon broke from the South Korean presidents before him by accentuating North Koreans\u2019 human rights.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of his predecessors made the explicit connection between freedom for all North Koreans and final liberation of the Korean Peninsula,\u201d Lee told VOA Korean on Thursday via email.<\/p>\n

Lee said Yoon was \u201cboldly emphasizing North Korea human rights and the protection of the right to speech and information of North Koreans, while seeking talks\u201d with Pyongyang.<\/p>\n

Evans Revere, who served as acting U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, agreed that North Korean human rights were at the core of the Yoon doctrine.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeoul is clearly planning to make these ideas the centerpiece of its approach to North Korea going forward,\u201d Revere told VOA Korean on Thursday via email.<\/p>\n

Revere said that the new approach has \u201cthe potential to create schisms\u201d inside North Korea and accelerate the process of political and social change if South Korea is \u201csuccessful in delivering this message to the people of North Korea through its radio and television broadcasts and by other means.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andrew Yeo, the SK-Korea Foundation chair at the Brookings Institution\u2019s Center for Asia Policy Studies, said that Yoon was intently focused on the notion of freedom of people on the Korean Peninsula, noting that the words \u201cfree\u201d or \u201cfreedom\u201d appear over 50 times in his speech.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see this as contradictory to reinforcing the idea of freedom-based unification,\u201d Yeo told VOA Korean on Thursday via email.<\/p>\n

Strong protest<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yeo, however, expressed skepticism about how the North Korean regime will respond to Yoon\u2019s proposal.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe call to establish an inter-Korean working group to discuss people-to-people cooperation and humanitarian engagement will ring hollow to Kim Jong Un given the Yoon government\u2019s emphasis on freedom before unification,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Revere said he was \u201chighly pessimistic\u201d that Pyongyang will react well to the proposal.<\/p>\n

Revere explained that words such as \u201cfreedom\u201d and \u201cdemocracy,\u201d which are highlighted in the new unification vision, are \u201canathema to the DPRK, as is the idea that the ROK intends to boost its efforts to get information to the North Korean people.\u201d<\/p>\n

DPRK stands for the Democratic People\u2019s Republic of Korea, North Korea\u2019s official name, while ROK is an abbreviation of South Korea\u2019s official name, Republic of Korea.<\/p>\n

Robert Rapson, who served as charg\u00e9 d\u2019affaires and deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Seoul from 2018 to 2021, cautioned that Yoon\u2019s vision could result in the escalation of tension.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf anything, it is bound to elicit sharp negative reactions in Pyongyang, and likely in Beijing, too, and lead to a heightening of tensions along the DMZ and across the peninsula,\u201d he told VOA Korean on Thursday via email.<\/p>\n

The United States voiced support for Yoon\u2019s proposal.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe long-standing, ironclad alliance between the United States and the Republic of Korea has contributed to peace, security and prosperity for Northeast Asia, the broader Indo-Pacific and beyond,\u201d a State Department spokesperson told VOA Korean on Friday via email.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe support President Yoon\u2019s aim to open a path for serious and sustained diplomacy with the DPRK,\u201d the spokesperson said, adding that \u201cwe are committed to working with allies and partners to promote human rights, accountability and access to information in the DPRK.\u201d<\/p>\n

China, North Korea\u2019s closest strategic partner, took a more reserved view.<\/p>\n

\u201cDPRK and ROK are the main parties to the Korean Peninsula issue, which should ultimately be resolved through dialogue and cooperation,\u201d a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington told VOA Korean on Friday in an emailed statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cChina supports all measures that are conducive to peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula,\u201d the spokesperson said. \u201cWe sincerely hope that the North-South relations will continue to improve and that the Korean Peninsula will maintain peace and stability.\u201d<\/p>\n

North Korea has not responded to Yoon\u2019s speech on its major state media outlets. – VOA<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON: South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol\u2019s freedom-based approach toward unifying the two Koreas could chart a bold path signaling a departure from the policies of his predecessors, experts in Washington said. In a speech commemorating South Korea\u2019s Liberation Day on Thursday, Yoon introduced the\u00a0\u201cAugust 15 Doctrine,\u201d\u00a0his vision for achieving a \u201cfreedom-based unification\u201d of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2012,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"2","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"1","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"0","show_popup_post":"0","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"1","show_post_related":"0","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"no-crop","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"","hide":""},"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"jnews_post_split":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-global","category-national"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2011"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2011\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2013,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2011\/revisions\/2013"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalinewshub.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}