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Open QuestionsWhy North Korea is starting to become a ‘forgotten’ space for China and the US
Political scientist Kim Heung-kyu on the state of play on the Korean peninsula and how Seoul can benefit from Beijing-Washington rivalry
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Kim Heung-kyu is a professor of political science and diplomacy and director of the US-China Policy Institute at Ajou University in Suwon, South Korea. He is also founder and president of the Plaza Project, a bipartisan think tank affiliated with the Korean National Assembly, and was a policy adviser for the South Korean presidential office. This interview first appeared in SCMP Plus. For other interviews in the Open Questions series, click here.
How do you assess the Korean peninsula situation as North Korea continues to advance its nuclear and missile programme, with no denuclearisation negotiations either with the United States or South Korea for more than five years?
North Korea had tried to improve its relationship with the United States through [former US President Donald] Trump in order to resolve its security issues, but this ended in failure. With the Hanoi summit [in 2019] as a starting point, Kim Jong-un seems to have completely made up his mind that it is impossible to solve North Korea’s security problem through negotiations or any improvement in relations with the US.
The only thing that can be done is self-help. To ensure that none of the great powers can harm North Korea’s sovereignty and interests, it needs a certain means – nuclear missiles. Thus it succeeded by pouring all of North Korea’s power and energy into it.
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