The Government of South Korea (ROK) expressed today its support for the Joint Statement of the Leaders of the Five Nuclear-Weapon States on Preventing Nuclear War and Avoiding Arms Races, issued on January 3, 2022.
In particular, the Korean government welcomes that the Five Nuclear-Weapon States, for the first time, jointly affirmed that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.”
Hope that Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty will be strengthened
ROK Goverment urges the Five Nuclear-Weapon States as well to take this opportunity to engage constructively in bilateral and multilateral dialogues aimed at achieving substantive progress in nuclear disarmament and preventing arms races.
The Korean Government expects that the Joint Statement will contribute to strengthening the global nuclear non-proliferation regime based on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as well as to enhancing international peace and stability.
ROK underlines that South Korea has been actively participating in multilateral initiatives promoting substantive nuclear disarmament including the Stockholm Initiative and the Creating an Environment for Nuclear Disarmament (CEND) and will continue its efforts to contribute to the strengthening of the NPT regime.
North Korea and Iran, still with ticktacking nuclear clocks
In fact ROK First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Choi Jong Kun is visiting Vienna from 4th to 9th January with the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action agreed with Iran on the nuclear issue) in the suticase.
The purpose of the visit by the Korean delegation is to explore ways to resolve the issue of frozen Iranian assets in Korea on the sidelines of the JCPOA negotiations by holding consultations with Iran as well as engaging in close coordination and communication with the United States, the European Union and the E3(France, Germany and the United Kingdom).
We must remember that Donald Trump decided to withdraw from the JCPOA. Now that the current US President Joe Biden decided to rejoin it Iran seems more open to advance in the agenda for peaceful uses of nuclear energy started with the JPOA during Obama’s Presidency of the USA.
The Korean government on its side, and so iti is said in an official communication published by the MOFA today, will continue to provide its diplomatic support for the restoration of the JCPOA, with a view to strengthening Korea-US cooperation on maintaining the non-proliferation regime and furthering ties between Korea and Iran as well.
But Iran is not the only tick tacking nuclear clock in Asia.
It should be remembered that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea or DPRK (North Korea) withdrew from the NPT (Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons) in 2003 and conducted its first nuclear test in 2006.
North Korea is the only country that has withdrawn the NPT and also remains Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT).
Kim Jong-un’s dictatorship regime has repeatedly violated the international law against nuclear testing by conducting tests in 2006, 2009, 2013, two tests in 2016, and a test in 2017.
The United Nations Security Council has passed numerous resolutions condemning North Korea’s nuclear activities, and has imposed increasingly harsh sanctions on the North Korean military and economy.
Meanwhile North Korea claimed its sixth nuclear test, in September 2017, was of a thermonuclear device.
International efforts to negotiate an end to North Korea’s nuclear program, which had been stalled since the discontinuation of the Six Party Talks in 2009, were reboosted in early 2018 and both Koreas’ athletes could be seen marching under one joint flag in the Winter Olympics Opening ceremony in February that same year..
The diplomatic works to stop the war between North Korea and ROK led to direct talks between the heads of state of the two Koreas, Kim Jong-un and Moon Jae-in, on 27 April 2018, followed by the 12 June 2018 summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and U.S. President Donald Trump in Singapore.
Although North Korea kept on affirming its commitment to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula at both summits, there has been little tangible progress towards denuclearization up to date and the COVID-10 pandemic is not helping at all to advance on this issue.
Despite both Koreas agreed ‘in principle’ on formal end or the war last 13th December, the fact is that North Korea keeps its boundary closed and recently said that its soldiers at the border line will shoot anyone trying to enter North Korea from the ROK.
Looking back to the never ended Korean War
North Korea, supported by Russia and being Kim Il-sung the leader of he comunist regime in the country, invaded the South on 25 June 1950, and swiftly overran most of the peninsula.
In September 1950 United Nations force, led by the USA, intervened to defend the South, and following the Incheon Landing and breakout from the Pusan Perimeter, rapidly advanced into North Korea.
As the UN force neared the border with China, Chinese forces intervened on behalf of North Korea, shifting the balance of the war again.
Fighting ended on 27 July 1953, with an armistice that approximately restored the original boundaries between North and South Korea.
Korea was devastated. Around three million civilians and soldiers had been killed. Seoul was in ruins, having changed hands four times. Several million North Korean refugees fled to the South.[31] Almost every substantial building in North Korea had been destroyed.[32][33] As a result, North Koreans developed a deep-seated antagonism towards the US.
The President of South Korea at that time, Syngman Rhee, opposed the armistice because it left Korea divided. He attempted to sabotage the arrangements for the release of prisoners, and led mass rallies against the armistice. He refused to sign the agreement, but reluctantly agreed to abide by it.
The armistice “triggered” an official ceasefire but never led to a peace treaty for two Koreas, setting the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between the two sides, that intersected the 38th parallel but did not follow it. Despite its name, the border was, and keeps on being today, one of the most militarized in the world.
Image over the headline.- Minstry of Foreign Affairs of the Republik of South Korea (fachade).© ROK Ministry of Foreign Affairs
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