When delivered an earlier this month, significant attention was directed toward North Korea. He announced his intention to and reminded his nation that he has adopted a with the North, such as ceasing anti-North propaganda balloon launches and loudspeaker broadcasts across the demilitarized border zone.
responded this week with a pledge to his country’s nuclear forces. His sister Kim Yo Jong, who serves as Pyongyang’s chief spokesperson, then issued a statement once again , despite Lee’s efforts to maintain the U.S.-South Korea alliance. The siblings the South for continuing with annual joint military exercises that .
Lee originates from the “progressive” faction, a group historically more inclined to extend concessions and assistance to Pyongyang. However, his more accommodating strategy has thus far yielded or silence. Regrettably, this is likely to persist.
The reasons are straightforward: for the present, the North Korean side gains nothing from warmer relations. For decades, Pyongyang primarily regarded South Korea as a source of in economic support. To state it plainly, North Korea treated the South as a nation-sized ATM—especially when progressive administrations were in power.
But North Korea has been subjected to a since 2017. This U.S.-led initiative aims to prevent North Korea from funding its nuclear program and has rendered large-scale economic cooperation between Seoul and Pyongyang virtually unfeasible.
From the North’s viewpoint, therefore, improving ties with Seoul serves little purpose: the old ATM is no longer functional.
It is true that U.N. sanctions did not prohibit humanitarian assistance or certain cultural activities, but this is not what North Korean leaders desire. They view cultural or other non-economic exchanges as detrimental to the hermit kingdom, given the between the two Korean states. Awareness of South Korea’s prosperity and freedoms inevitably prompts questions about whether the North Korean system is truly superior and whether their leaders are as wise as they claim.
Moreover, Pyongyang is not as desperate for South Korean aid as it once was. Arms sales worth an and consistent have helped alleviate its difficulties—at least for the time being. Pyongyang would also prefer to avoid appearing weak by accepting humanitarian aid it can now manage without.
What the North seeks is financial and material assistance, without conditions attached and presented as tribute rather than aid. Undoubtedly, the Lee administration is quite willing to provide such assistance, whether through joint industrial or tourist projects like the pursued in the past. But South Korea will not openly violate the U.N. sanctions regime.
That is why any significant shift in inter-Korean relations requires the lifting—or at least the meaningful relaxation—of U.N. sanctions. This is a step only the U.S. could orchestrate, and in practice, only Donald Trump might attempt.
During his first term, Trump came quite close to forging such an agreement with Pyongyang. At the February 2019 U.S.-North Korea summit in Hanoi, the two sides discussed a framework under which North Korea would agree to dismantle its major nuclear facilities. In return, the U.S. was anticipated to endorse a revision of U.N. sanctions policy—a move that other members of the Security Council would likely not have opposed once Washington gave its consent. However, in the end, the two sides to agree on the details, and the .
It is possible, however, that negotiations will resume shortly; some U.S. officials have recently about the prospects of renewed engagement with Pyongyang, and even Trump himself said a couple of months ago that he had a “” with Kim Jong Un and hoped to “solve the conflict” with North Korea.
If negotiations do commence, there remains a genuine, but limited, chance of success. North Korea will not, under any circumstances, relinquish its . Yet from Pyongyang’s perspective, there is a certain logic in pursuing a nuclear arms control agreement (if it comes with the right perks). Such a deal could offer the regime a means of easing its heavy reliance on China and Russia, the only two countries that are willing to disregard the U.N. sanctions regime when dealing with North Korea. The North Korean leadership considers such dependence burdensome, especially concerning China.
In any case, progress in inter-Korean relations ultimately hinges on direct U.S.–North Korea discussions. Only if those negotiations succeed will Seoul and Pyongyang be able to move forward. And that remains, at best, a very significant uncertainty.