North Korean state media rejected the South’s call for talks Thursday, calling the proposal “nonsense,” but the reclusive regime may be open to negotiations with the U.S.
The Rodong Sinmun, the paper of the ruling party, condemned the South Korean government for “mentioning the improvement in relations while showing enmity” towards Pyongyang, suggesting that the call for negotiations “does not hold water.”
South Korea’s Vice Defense Minister Suh Choo Suk, speaking on behalf of the new South Korean government, proposed Monday a meeting between the two sides in the border village of Panmunjom to discuss military and humanitarian issues, but the proposal has so far gone unanswered.
North Korea criticized the South for “showing an obsolete confrontational attitude” toward its northern neighbor “while dancing to the U.S. and conservative group’s tune.” The North asserted that “ditching confrontation and hostility is a precondition for opening the door for the two Koreas’ reconciliation and unity,” adding that the new administration under the leadership of South Korean President Moon Jae-in has failed to learn from the mistakes of the former Park Geun-hye administration, the policies of which were the North deemed antagonistic.
North Korea cut several lines of communication after the previous administration closed a joint economic project.
The state media publication said that the proposal demonstrated a “lack of logic” on the part of the new South Korean government.
While talks with the South may be off the table for the time being, North Korea appears to be trying for a peace treaty with the U.S.
Kim Jong-un supposedly sent an “urgent directive” instructing North Korean diplomats to pursue peace with the U.S. that does not require the North to abandon its nuclear weapons, Japan’s Asahi Shimbun reported Thursday, according to the Korea Herald. The report has not been independently verified, but it is possible that Pyongyang believes its nuclear weapons and new intercontinental ballistic missile gives it leverage in a negotiation with the U.S.
A North Korean diplomat in late June suggested that the North would be willing to temporarily halt nuclear weapons and ballistic missile testing in exchange for a suspension of U.S.-South Korean joint military drills, indicating that negotiations could potentially follow.
“We’ll have dialogue if the conditions are there,” Choe Son Hui, head of U.S. affairs for the North Korean foreign ministry, told South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency in Beijing in May. She did not specify which conditions would need to be met for talks to take place.
Despite the occasional overture, North Korea has made clear that denuclearization is not option, which remains a roadblock for the U.S., which remains deeply committed to the pursuit of a denuclearized Korean Peninsula.
While the South is open to talks, the U.S. administration is not willing to negotiate with North Korea at this time, asserting that the conditions are not right. “Any type of conditions that would have to be met” for talks “are clearly far away from where we are now,” White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said earlier this week.
The Trump administration is pursuing a policy of “maximum pressure and engagement,” which involves military deterrence, tough economic sanctions and diplomatic pressure.
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