Pyongyang and Tokyo’s surprise

http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2990445

Pyongyang and Tokyo’s surprise
북일합의를 환영한다

Japan has managed to do what Korea and the United States have never been able to. The Obama administration’s North Korean policy is supposed to be all about “strategic patience,” but it’s actually all about “nonstrategic nonaction.” The focus of U.S. foreign policy simply shifted from the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asia to the Middle East. While Pyongyang continued to demand to talk with the United States, Washington simply shrugged that it will come to the negotiation table only after Pyongyang begins its denuclearization process. The United States is not willing to meet to discuss denuclearization. While Washington is gearing up to tighten sanctions against North Korea, such a measure cannot fatally affect North Korea as long as China is there to keep open the loopholes in the sanctions.

The Park Geun-hye administration is bound by a fundamentalist North Korean policy grounded in the hard-line principles of the three key national security officials — Kim Jang-soo, Nam Jae-joon and Kim Kwan-jin. Seoul is not talking to Pyongyang, and the high-level diplomatic meeting following the resumption of business at the Kaesong Industrial Complex was a one-off event. With Pyongyang threatening a fourth nuclear test, the prospects for denuclearization is growing murkier.

North Korea is responsible for its own isolation, but China’s attitude is making it feel painfully left out. Two and half years have passed since the Kim Jong-un regime began, but a Pyongyang-Beijing summit has not yet been held. Last year, President Park visited China and Chinese President Xi Jinping is to come to Seoul soon. Kim Jong-un can only feel frustrated and neglected as China, the only supporter of North Korea, gives him the cold shoulder. Beijing’s attitude added pressure on North Korea, which was cornered by the sanctions levied by the United Nations Security Council in March 2013. Seeing things in this context, Kim Jong-un made a well-timed choice to find an escape from his isolation by cozying up to Japan.

Shinzo Abe had initiated a meeting with relatives of abducted Japanese in 1997. In 2002, as a cabinet minister, he accompanied then-Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on his visit to Pyongyang. The resolution of the abduction issue has been a key objective of his entire political career. When Abe became prime minister in 2006, he made that issue his top administrative priority. To Abe, the abduction issue is a multipurpose card. He not only gains domestic popularity by flashing it, but can also use it as a lever to influence South Korea when Seoul-Tokyo ties go into a deep freeze, where they are now. It is also a natural choice for the Abe government to use the drift between Pyongyang and Beijing as Japan-China ties are pretty bad too due to a territorial dispute.