Seoul will continue to pursue peaceful coexistence with North Korea, President Lee Jae Myung said on Thursday, despite Pyongyang’s rejection of all ties with the “hostile” South at the Ninth Party Congress.

“Longstanding hostility and confrontational attitudes cannot be erased by a single groundbreaking measure,” he said during a meeting with senior officials at the Blue House. 

“There is an old Korean saying that one spoonful of rice won’t make you full,” he said. “It cannot be achieved overnight.”

Lee acknowledged that North Korea expressed “very hostile rhetoric and distrust toward the South,” but argued that Seoul must move beyond