SEOUL, South Korea — After a day of breakthrough talks, North and South Korea announced three key agreements toward reconciliation on the Peninsula, fuelling hopes for a breakthrough after two years of silence.
Tuesday’s proposals included the North’s participation in the upcoming PyeongChang Winter Olympics; easing military tensions; and actively pursuing resolution-driven dialogues.
South and North Korea agreed to conduct talks on military matters in a bid to ease tensions at the countries’ border with a hotline that will be in full operation starting Wednesday.
These agreements came after Pyongyang reopened a military hotline with Seoul and offered to send a delegation to the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.
According to the joint press statement released Tuesday, the Olympic Games should “be an opportunity to raise the status of Korea” implying a shared vision and interest for the Peninsula.
After a high-level meeting between the two sides, Pyongyang and Seoul agreed to continue the discussions, with the North also agreeing to the military talks, which were proposed by the South in July.
The inter-Korean communication channel was severed by the North in February 2016 after the closure of a jointly operated industrial park by Seoul.
On Tuesday, Pyongyang decided to “dispatch delegates of the National Olympic Committee of North Korea, athletes, cheering and performing squads, observers, tae kwon do demonstrators and reporters together with high-level delegates to the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.
The South decided to ensure the necessary accommodations, according to the press statement.
Yonhap reported that the channel’s reopening could indicate that Pyongyang may want to send its Olympic delegation by land, using the hotline to alert its neighbor of movements at the Kaesong border complex.
During Tuesday’s talks in the “truce village” of Panmunjom, Winter Olympics host South Korea proposed that athletes from both countries make a joint entrance to the opening and closing ceremonies at next month’s event, and that reunions of families separated during the Korean War could take place during the Games.
The head of South Korea’s delegation, Unification Minister Cho Myoung Gyon, said shortly before the meeting he hoped next month’s Games could be an “event of peace and a stepping stone for better inter-Korea relations.”
His North Korean counterpart, Ri Son Gwon, said later, as the meeting began, that Pyongyang was hoping “to give precious results to the Korean people who harbour high expectations for this meeting,” South Korean Yonhap news agency reported.
It was hoped that the talks would lead to an improvement in the rivals’ relations, after ties deteriorated significantly last year due to Pyongyang’s rapidly accelerating ballistic missile and nuclear weapons testing programs.
There had been no official inter-Korean talks since late 2015. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres praised the moves in a statement, saying the Olympics can “foster an atmosphere of peace, tolerance and understanding among nations” and that he hopes the talks will lead to the resumption of sincere dialogue and denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula.
China, Russia and the U.S. also issued statements welcoming the meeting.
“As a neighbor of the Korean Peninsula, China welcomes and supports the recent positive actions taken by the two Koreas to ease their mutual relations,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said.
“We believe it is only possible to achieve a de-escalation of tensions through this dialogue,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in comments carried by state news agency TASS.
The U.S. remains “in close consultations” with South Korean officials, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement welcoming the meeting.
South Korean officials will make sure North Korea’s participation in the Winter Olympics does not violate U.N. sanctions, Nauert added.
Analysts say North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s attempt to restore dialogue with Seoul could be a gambit intended to drive a wedge between South Korea and the United States.
North and South Korea on Friday agreed to hold the talks after both sides extended olive branches earlier last week.
After boasting about North Korea’s nuclear weapons capabilities in his New Year’s address, Kim offered to send a delegation to the Pyeongchang Games in South Korea and said that he sincerely hoped the event would be “a success,” prompting Seoul to propose the meeting.
The two Koreas remain in a technical state of war. The 1950-53 Korean War ended only in a cease-fire, but no peace deal was ever signed.
