North Korea Dismisses Seoul's 'Nonsense' Wish For Better Ties
Three days after South Korea proposed military talks with North Korea, it was rejected Thursday and termed as "nonsense" by Pyongyang, according to the South Korean Yonhap News Agency which cited a newspaper in Pyongyang.
While announcing the rejection of the offer to talk, Rodong Sinmun, the main paper of North Korea asked South Korea to decide if it wanted to “stick to its confrontational policy and submission to the U.S.,” reports said.
"Ditching confrontation and hostility is a precondition for opening the door for the two Koreas' reconciliation and unity," the newspaper said.
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The reply from North Korea is a significant setback for South Korean President Moon Jae-in who has been trying to initiate peace talks with North Korea for some time now and proposed a military talk Monday with Pyongyang to discuss ways to reduce tensions on the heavily militarized border, a Newsweek report said.
"Talks and cooperation between the two Koreas to ease tension and bring about peace on the Korean peninsula will be instrumental for pushing forth a mutual, virtuous cycle for inter-Korea relations and North Korea's nuclear problem," South Korea's Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon said in a news briefing.
The meeting was reportedly proposed to be held July 21 at Tongilgak, which is a North Korean building at the Panmunjom truce village on the border. The building has been used for inter-Korea talks previously, with the last such talk held in December, 2015.
Moon Jae-in is also looking for a deal that will see the “complete denuclearization” of North Korea and offered a peace treaty in return that would guarantee the survival of North Korea’s ruler, Kim Jong Un, Bloomberg reported.
Moon's objectives in his five year plan, as announced by the Blue House in a report, include coming up with a “negotiation plan for comprehensive denuclearization that will lead a nuclear freeze” and ultimately dismantling the weapons completely. It also stated Moon would propose a road map this year and that “the treaty will be signed when denuclearization is complete and the peace regime will be maintained in a stable way.”
This is the first time he had come up with a detailed engagement policy with a timeline. The South Korean government has also said it wanted North Korea to respond to via communication channels that were suspended after tension gripped the region in 2016.
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In February 2016, two inter-Korean communication channels were cut off by North Korea after Seoul shut down a joint industrial complex in the North's border city of Kaesong in response to the Pyongyang's nuclear and missile tests.
In addition, South Korea had also proposed separate talks to reunite families who were separated during the 1950-53 Korean War. China, which has ties with North Korea, even after having criticized the country for its missile and nuclear tests, had also welcomed the proposal and advocated the efforts to reduce tensions, according to Newsweek.
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