Start-again, stop-again. That seems to be the repeating mantra of inter-Korean affairs.

Despite being unabashedly in favor of inter-Korean engagement, it took over six months following Moon Jae-in becoming President of South Korea in May 2017 for North Korea to become interested in considering engagement with his government.

But once that engagement started – precipitated by the Winter Olympics in early 2018 – inter-Korean talks quickly gained momentum, resulting in three summits between Moon and Kim Jong Un that year.

Yet although the last of those resulted in the signing of the Pyongyang Declaration – and subsequent inter-Korean military confidence-building