Today was the day Seoul should be holding talks with North Korea on arranging reunions
for separated families.
However, like the offer for military talks, no response.
Our unification ministry correspondent Kwon Jang-ho joins us in the studio to make sense
of the situation.
Jang-ho, let's start with a brief outline of the current situation.
Sure, Daniel.
So earlier this month on July 4th, President Moon Jae-in gave an address in Berlin, where
he outlined his North Korea policy vision.
In it he pledged to start dialogue with the regime: first to engage in military talks
to end hostile activity on the border, and second to hold talks for reunions for separated
families.
On his return to Seoul, the government sent a message to Pyongyang proposing the talks
be held on July 21st and August 1st, respectively.
However, those dates have now passed and there has been no response or even any acknowledgment
of the offers from North Korea.
Pyongyang has given Seoul the cold shoulder.
What can we take away from the silence.
Well I don't think anyone expected it to be easy.
North Korea usually likes to do things on their own terms, so we were perhaps at first
expecting North Korea to rebuff the proposal and come back with a counter offer.
This protracted silence was perhaps a little unexpected, but here's one expert who says
it's not necessarily a bad sign.
"Normally when North Korea rejects South Korea's offers, it does it directly.
For example, if you look at the past two administrations, when North Korea had a grievance, it expressed
it within 2 to 3 days.
But this time, the regime has not made any official response...they're also not making
direct criticisms of the Moon administration.
Pyongyang is not openly rejecting Seoul's offer, but it is showing that it wants to
take things forward on its own terms."
It could be interpreted as a tactic to keep options open, especially as I understand that
Seoul has said that the door for talks remain open?
That's right.
Yesterday the Unification Ministry made a statement saying that the lack of response
does not change the administration's policy of pursuing both sanctions and talks, and
they called on North Korea to respond soon.
But what about the missile launch.
Should we not interprete that as a snub towards Seoul's offer of talks?
Not necessarily.
Obviously the missile launch was a concerning event, especially considering the leap it
showed in its technical capability to reach the mainland U.S.
There have been some calls for the Moon administration to reconsider its North Korea policy, and
it could be a test of Moon's resolve to stick with the administration's current direction.
However the ICBM is also more largely seen as an act of defiance against the U.S. and
the international community rather than Seoul, and so therefore does not necessarily affect
Seoul's pursuit of dialogue.
"An ICBM is a long-range ballistic missile, therefore it is aimed at pressuring the U.S.
rather than South Korea, especially if you look at the timing, which came right after
U.S. House passed sanctions bill on Russia, Iran and North Korea.
The launch was about sending a message to Washington, rather than a rejection of Seoul's
offer for talks."
North Korea may not have put a full stop and rejected the offer for talks yet.
Seoul will continue to wait, despite Pyongyang's provocations for now.
Right.
One point I would like to quickly make is that among all this inter-Korean politics
is a humanitarian issue.
Today's deadline was for the talks on the reunion of separated families, and there are
some 65-thousand registered South Koreans who are waiting to take part in these reunions
after being separated from their loved ones over 60 years ago by the Korean war.
But time is running out for those surviving, as more and more of those registered war torn
family members pass away over the years, and so the quicker a response we get from North
Korea the more hope there will be for them.
Of course.
Thank you for coming in today, Jang-ho.