South Korea and China promised yesterday to cooperate to maintain stability on the Korean peninsula, in the face of a new rise in tension with the North, following Pyongyang launched the first spy satellite.
Meeting this Sunday in the city of Busan, in the southwest of South Korea, South Korean Foreign Minister, Park Jin, and his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, discussed the North’s latest technological developments.
On Tuesday, Pyongyang placed a spy satellite into orbit, something that led Seoul to partially suspend a bilateral military agreement signed in 2018 to avoid accidental clashes between the two countries.
Park assured Wang that the decision is a “minimal” defensive measure in the face of North Korea’s growing belligerence and called on the head of Chinese diplomacy to strengthen cooperation in such a scenario.
The minister called on “China to play a constructive role, as it is in the common interest of South Korea and China for North Korea to stop its provocations and take the path of denuclearization.”
According to the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Wang Yi expressed “concern” regarding the increase in tension in the region following the satellite launch and said that Beijing will do its part “to help stabilize the situation”.
According to information cited by South Korean news agency Yonhap, Wang reiterated China’s call for calm and moderation, assuring that Beijing will continue to play a constructive role in promoting peace and stability on the peninsula.
Park and Wang met in Busan hours before a meeting with Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa to try to revive regular trilateral summits.
Park also met this morning with Kamikawa, with whom he addressed outstanding bilateral issues, including South Korean women forced into sexual slavery in Japanese military brothels during World War II.
On Thursday, a South Korean court ordered Japan to compensate 16 women, in a ruling that annulled the decision of a lower court that had rejected, two years earlier, compensation for these women.
Tokyo has consistently refused to appear before South Korean courts, maintaining that the dispute had been resolved by the 1965 treaty, which involved the payment of around 733 million euros in compensation in the form of grants and low-interest loans.
On Saturday, Kamikawa spoke with Wang, especially regarding the restrictions imposed by China on the import of seafood from Japan following the start of the discharge of treated water from the Fukushima nuclear plant at the end of August.
