Yoon vows to 'extend freedom' to North Korea during Liberation Day speech

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Yoon vows to 'extend freedom' to North Korea during Liberation Day speech

Published: 15 Aug. 2024, 18:13 Updated: 15 Aug. 2024, 20:31

MICHAEL LEE
lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr

President Yoon Suk Yeol and first lady Kim Keon Hee, third and second from right, wave Korean flags during a ceremony marking the 79th anniversary of the end of Japan's colonial occupation of the peninsula at the Sejong Performing Arts Center in Jongno District, central Seoul, on Thursday. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]

President Yoon Suk Yeol promised to expand information access for North Koreans and called on Pyongyang to engage in dialogue with Seoul during a speech marking Liberation Day on Thursday.

The annual holiday, which falls on Aug. 15, marks the end of Japan’s 35-year colonial occupation of Korea at the end of World War II in 1945.

While Korean presidents have usually spoken about the country’s often-fraught ties with Japan on Liberation Day, Yoon made scant mention of Tokyo during his speech, which instead focused mainly on Pyongyang.

Calling the liberation of the Korean Peninsula an “unfinished task,” Yoon argued that “freedom must be extended to the frozen kingdom of the North, where people are deprived of freedom and suffer from poverty and starvation.”

The president said “complete liberation” would only be achieved “when a unified free and democratic nation rightfully owned by the people is established across the entire Korean Peninsula.”

To achieve unification, Yoon argued that South Korea should remain vigilant in defending its freedom from destabilizing elements while working to improve human rights in the North.

The president also proposed a regular working group of officials from both Koreas to conduct talks on how to reduce tensions, restart economic cooperation and increase people-to-people exchanges, such as families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War.

Yoon’s latest overture came despite North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s outright rejection of reconciliation with Seoul, which he labeled his regime’s “primary enemy” at the beginning of the year.

Kim also signed a mutual defense treaty with Russian President Vladimir Putin during his visit to Pyongyang in June.

Yoon further promised massive development and food aid for the North if it were to “take just one step toward denuclearization,” repeating the central pledge of his so-called Audacious Initiative that the North rejected outright at the time of its announcement two years ago.

Although Yoon urged the North to respond to the proposal, it included other components that are also likely to be non-starters for a regime that has bristled at criticism of its human rights record, which multiple international organizations have described as having no parallel in the contemporary world.

Visitors at Independence Hall in Cheonan, South Chungcheong, celebrate the 79th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japan on Thursday. [NEWS1]

One item of the talks proposed by the president is the issue of South Korean prisoners of war who were involuntarily kept in the North after the 1953 armistice was signed and people abducted by the regime’s agents afterward.

In another move that is likely to further anger Pyongyang, the president also said Seoul plans to increase North Koreans’ access to outside information through radio and television broadcasts to “help make them aware of the false propaganda and instigations propagated by their regime.”

As part of that effort, the president pledged to establish a state-backed fund to support civic groups that promote freedom and human rights in the North.

“If more North Koreans realize that unification through freedom is the only way to improve their lives and are convinced that the Republic of Korea will embrace them, they will become a strong, friendly contingent to support a freedom-based unification,” he said, referring to South Korea by its official name.

Yoon also promised that his administration would continue to offer aid to help victims of natural disasters in the North, as it did earlier this month in response to flooding in areas bordering China.

“By offering aid for flood victims in North Korea, we made it clear that our government has no intention of turning a blind eye to the North Korean people’s suffering,” he said, adding that the South would “never stop offering humanitarian aid” despite the regime’s recent refusal to accept assistance.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]