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South Korea‘s Unification Lee Jong-seok, right, and Lee‘s counterpart Kwon Ho-woong, North Korea‘s chief delegate to Ministrial-leve Ministrial Talks of South-North Koreas, walking out of the negotiation room when they met in April 2006.
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Pyongyang’s motives in cancellation still unclear
The South Korean government has said it will take “multi-pronged measures” with the North to push to carry out the test run of inter-Korean rail lines scheduled for yesterday but abruptly cancelled by the North. The government did not offer specifics on its planned measures, and reasons behind the North’s sudden pullout from the tests remain murky. Experts say the cancellation of the test run was a military decision, as the North Korean military was reportedly concerned about both the justification of holding the trial run after its expectations of territorial and monetary gain had not been met. Their doubts in turn prompted Kim Jong-il, chairman of the North’s National Defense Commission, to accept the military’s position, experts say. The South Korean government for the most part agrees with this analysis, but still considers the North’s decision ambivalent. The North Korean military expected the South to give an answer May 16-18 on redrawing the maritime border between the two Koreas, called the Northern Limit Line, but no answer was given. Also, the agreements made at a South-North Economic Cooperation Meeting in Kaesong May 18-19, were less than satisfactory to the North, experts say. In addition, the South has not given an answer yet to the North’s request, made at minister-level talks in late April, to send 500,000 tons of food aid.The South is seen as using economic cooperation as a bargaining chip in order to get a military guarantee from the North for the safety guarantee of the train test-runs, but the North may not have been satisfied with their end of the deal so far, as Pyongyang first did not come through on the military guarantee and now has cancelled the scheduled test run. What the South had agreed on in exchange for the test runs was 4-5 billion won (4-5 million USD) worth of diesel oil and construction materials. Some say sweetening the economic package will still not placate the North. A telegram sent to the South late afternoon on May 23 seems to support this, as the North wrote that the test run issue could not be resolved "unless fundamental problems such as preventing maritime clashes off the West coast" are solved first, referring to the altering of the Northern Limit Line. A breakthrough is hoped for at the 12th formal talks on economic cooperation scheduled in early June. When the talks open, aid offers of textiles, shoes, and soap will be discussed, along with 500,000 tons of loaned rice. However, officials at the South Korean government said there is no justification for agreement from the South on these points due to the North’s cancellation. The North must first show its trust by allowing the trials, the officials said. In addition to any ground that might be gained through the economic cooperation talks, the South and the North are also likely to resume working-level military talks on the train’s test run.
