[Yonhap News Photo]
SEOUL -- With North Korea leader Kim Jong-un and U.S. President Donald Trump set to hold a historic epoch-making face-to-face in Singapore, the world is watching closely with expectations and skepticism.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in described the meeting as "a century of encounter", urging the two leaders to make a "bold" decision work out a bid deal on end deep-rooted hostilities and denuclearizing the Korean peninsula.
However, Moon cautioned that everything cannot be solved "at once by one summit." "Even after the two leaders have set the tone, it takes a long and unpredictable process, probably one and two years or more for a complete settlement. We need a long breath to successfully lead this process."
Some experts supported Moon's prudent attitude, citing a track record of North Korea reneging on previous accords. "I honestly have few expectations of the meeting, given that both leaders have reputations for being mercurial," said Chong Ja Ian, an associate professor at the National University of Singapore.
He expressing skepticism about practical progress toward complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization. "The point is that there are lots of examples of arrangements that get scuttled by various factors and other stakeholders."
Other stakeholders such as China, Russia, Japan, South Korea may cause trouble if they think they interests are sacrificed. "These stakeholders may have an incentive to complicate matters should they feel that their interests have been unnecessarily or unreasonably sacrificed," Chong said.
"At one extreme, they can press some crisis with North Korea, possibly upset President Trump somehow, or openly reject whatever deal Pyongyang and Washington come up with," he said, adding they can also quietly weaken any arrangement that requires their participation and press for some sort of renegotiations.
The world hopes to see concrete action plans on top of their written commitments to break away from the past vicious circle of reaching accords and reneging on them.
There has been an apparent discord over how to realize denuclearization. Washington was quick and complete steps to remove North Korean nuclear weapons and facilities. Pyongyang's top priority has been its regime security and if possible, a non-aggression accord and diplomatic normalization, which have been a long-standing demand since the two sides fought against each other during the 1950-53 Korean War.
"It appears the upcoming summit will be determined by the final negotiation between the two leaders when they meet face to face and hold frank dialogue, rather than a meeting where working-level officials arrange everything and the leaders only ink the agreement as a formal ritual," said South Korean presidential spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom.
A potential Singapore declaration should be backed by a transparent and independent inspection of all North Korean nuclear facilities, said Lee Jae-ho, a politics professor at Dongshin University.
"North Korea's nuclear facilities should be randomly selected and checked unconditionally," Lee said. "We must strongly push the United States to not yield on matters related to inspections."
reporter
Lim Chang-won
cwlim34@ajunews.com
