ADRN

The next Inter-Korean summit is due to take place on April 27, 2018, ten years and six months after the last summit back in 2007. Despite numerous attempts to resolve the issue, the North Korean nuclear problem has remained intractable. But with a series of summits scheduled over the next month, a tentative hope for progress has emerged. The mere fact that North Korea, which has long maintained its "peace treaty first, denuclearization next" approach, agreed to the summits implies that North Korea has changed its perception of the negotiations. In this article, Dr. Young-Sun Ha, Chairman of EAI focuses on the importance of an accurate analysis of North Korea's position on two key items in the North Korean nuclear negotiation; denuclearization and a security guarantee, and discusses whether North Korea's terms will be acceptable to South Korea and the US. According to Dr. Ha, total denuclearization of North Korea will require both a guaranteed defense capability for a denuclearized North Korea that surpasses the security provided by nuclear weapons and the preparation of a complex plan based on mutual trust that ensures North Korea's security.