SEOUL: South Korean President Park Geun-Hye heads for a summit in China, looking to exploit signs of Beijing’s growing frustration with its unpredictable ally North Korea.
The North and its nuclear weapons programme will dominate the agenda of Park’s summit talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, which will be anxiously monitored by the regime in Pyongyang.
Speaking to senior officials on Monday, Park said her priority in Beijing would be to “harden” China-South Korea cooperation on “attaining the goal of North Korea’s denulcearisation”.
Officials in South Korea feel the time is ripe for a re-calibration of the Seoul-Beijing-Pyongyang axis.
“China has traditionally emphasised the need to keep North Korea stable, while trying to solve the nuclear issue,” said Choi Woo-Seon, a professor at the state-run Korea National Diplomatic Academy.
“But the two issues are actually sometimes contradictory and these days China’s position is gradually moving closer to the position of the US and South Korea.”
Washington and Seoul have made it clear they will never accept the idea of North Korea as a nuclear state, and insist Pyongyang must show a tangible commitment to abandoning its nuclear weapons if it wants substantive talks. Both have pressured China — North Korea’s sole major ally and economic lifeline — to use all its leverage to bring Pyongyang to heel.
North Korea appears to have moderated its line after a series of incendiary threats in recent months against Seoul and Washington. While a planned meeting with South Korea fell through, it has offered direct talks with the United States, and has sent two envoys to Beijing in the past four weeks.
China’s relationship with North Korea was forged in the 1950-53 Korean War which China entered to prevent the North’s total defeat. ut it has weakened significantly over the years, as China’s economic transformation has distanced it from the ideological rigidity of the dynastic Kim regime across the border.
In line with UN sanctions, Beijing has moved to restrict Pyongyang’s financial operations in China which the international community says are the major conduit for funding its nuclear weapons programme.
“China tended to emphasise dialogue rather than pressure in the past, but I think that Chinese leaders began to realise it’s necessary to put some strong pressure on North Korea,” Choi said. AFP
