Kim Dae-jung is widely remembered as a peacemaker today, so it’s not as well known that his presidency (1998-2003) didn’t start off on such friendly footing with North Korea.
In fact, for his first two years, North Korean state media treated him more or less the same as his center-right predecessors. They greeted his arrival by declaring no mere change of government could resolve inter-Korean differences, regardless of how lofty the talk coming out of Seoul was.
The Korean Central News Agency, in fact, declared that if Kim wanted better ties he should
Kim Dae-jung is widely remembered as a peacemaker today, so it’s not as well known that his presidency (1998-2003) didn’t start off on such friendly footing with North Korea.
In fact, for his first two years, North Korean state media treated him more or less the same as his center-right predecessors. They greeted his arrival by declaring no mere change of government could resolve inter-Korean differences, regardless of how lofty the talk coming out of Seoul was.
Rob York is director for regional affairs at the Pacific Forum. He previously worked as a production editor for The South China Morning Post and chief editor of NK News. He is also a Ph.D. candidate in Korean history at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.