Park’s ‘Dresden Doctrine’ faces tough test

North Korea reacts to peace initiative with provocations

Barely 10 days after President Park Geun-hye came up with a package of proposals for the future unification of the two Koreas during her visit to the German city of Dresden last month, her so-called “Dresden Doctrine” has generated a great deal of attention.

North Korea immediately rejected Park’s propositions which include humanitarian aid and other substantial packages for the impoverished country. Instead, it embarked on a series of provocative actions.

Just two days after the announcement of the peace overture, the North’s regime threatened to carry out a “new form of nuclear test,” which would be its fourth overall, and continued to fire rockets and missiles to irritate its neighbors.

Last week, it fired more than 100 shells directed south of the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de-facto border of the two Koreas in the West Sea.

It is also suspected of sending drones to take pictures of Cheong Wa Dae and other military installations.

However, observers pointed out Monday that the Park administration should not give up just yet.

“President Park and her aides will not have expected that the North would immediately take the Dresden proposal with a warm-hearted welcome,” said Prof. Yoo Ho-yeol from Korea University.

“With the Dresden Doctrine, she outlined her new North Korea policies and it will take quite a long time to bring the North to a negotiation table. The Stalinist regime will not change overnight.”

Chang Yong-seok, a researcher at the Institute of Peace and Unification Studies affiliated with Seoul National University, concurred.

“Pyongyang currently takes issue with the joint military drills between Seoul and Washington. We need to check whether Pyongyang will change its stance later this month after the exercises finish,” Chang said.

“As the Dresden declaration features some attractive suggestions for the North, it might want to embrace some of them. We need to keep an eye on its internal politics.”

The South and the United States have conducted a series of military war games this year. Key Resolve, a command-post drill, ended early last month but Foal Eagle, a field training exercise, will run through April 18.

Dresden Doctrine

On March 28, Park was at the Dresden University of Technology to receive an honorary doctorate degree where she also delivered a speech.

Within her address at the former East German city, a symbol of its unification, Park stressed the three key areas of “humanity, co-prosperity and integration” for laying the groundwork for a peaceful end to almost 70 years of division on the Korean Peninsula.

The specific action plans of her policy includes extending humanitarian aid, beginning economic programs, and investing in social infrastructure projects in transportation and telecommunication in North Korea.

For example, it plans to extend an existing program of providing healthcare support for pregnant mothers and infants in North Korea through their first 1,000 days.

She also proposed multi-farming complexes to support agriculture, livestock and forestry in areas in the North suffering from deforestation and grappling with primitive agricultural techniques.

“Working together from sowing to harvesting will enable South and North Korea not just to share the fruits of our labor, but also our hearts. As the bonds of trust begin to burgeon between the two sides, we can start to look at larger forms of development cooperation,” Park said.

Park suggested that Seoul and Pyongyang set up an “inter-Korean exchange and cooperation office” in their respective capital cities to oversee the implementation of the envisioned project.

Meanwhile, she did not specifically mention North Korea’s denuclearization as a precondition for the three humanitarian and cooperative programs. Unlike the humanitarian package, denuclearization was the main condition for the other economic and financial packages she outlined.

Only when Pyongyang forgoes its nuclear ambitions, only then will Seoul proactively help it regain membership in international financial institutions and attracting foreign investment.

Under the same conditions, Park added that Seoul would spearhead the establishment of a Northeast Asia Development Bank aimed at boosting the moribund economy of the North.

“Now more than ever, South and North Korea must broaden their exchange and cooperation. What we need is not one-off promotional events, but the kind of interaction and cooperation that enables ordinary South Koreans and North Koreans to recover a sense of common identity as they help each other,” Park said.

What’s next?

Pundits claim that the success or otherwise of the Dresden Doctrine largely depends on the South, not the North.

In other words, they contend that the Park administration needs to double its efforts to improve relationships with the recalcitrant North without repeating the flukes of her immediate predecessor Lee Myung-bak.

Chang of the Institute of Peace and Unification Studies said that the Dresden Doctrine will not materialize if the South sticks to denuclearization as a prerequisite for all the projects.

“In case Park follows in the footsteps of former President Lee who adamantly put denuclearization as a precondition for all inter-Korean joint activities, the Dresden Doctrine would not yield any fruit,” Chang said.

Paik Hak-soon, a senior researcher at the private Sejong Institute in Seoul, emphasized the policy differences between President Park and ex-President Lee, whose tenure saw inter-Korean relationships reach its lowest ebb.

“Since the election campaigns in late 2012, Park iterated that humanitarian work can start off even without the North’s denuclearization,” said Paik.

“And I hope that the Dresden Doctrine is in line with such a flexible approach, which would eventually help thaw the icy relations between the two Koreas.”

Of note is whether Seoul will lift the “May 24 measures,” a host of sanctions imposed on Pyongyang after the South’s frigate Cheonan was sunk in March 2010 by an unprovoked torpedo attack in the West Sea.

The international investigation team tasked with probing the incident blamed the North for the unprecedented tragedy but it denied any involvement.

In response Seoul banned all trade and investment with the North. The sole exception is the inter-Korean joint industrial zone in the North’s border city of Gaeseong.

In order to implement the specific schemes of the Dresden initiative, Seoul has to scrap the May 24 sanctions. Furthermore, they are also impediments in the trilateral projects between the two Koreas and Russia, including the Rajin-Khasan joint project.

On the sidelines of a summit between Park and Russian President Vladimir Putin last November, Seoul and Moscow signed an agreement to join the Russia-North Korean railway venture.

Opposition lawmakers have called for the lifting of some of the strong sanctions on the North, which they argue cost some $9 billion in damages to the South compared to about $2.25 billion to the North.

Worst-case scenario

The current standoffs between the two Koreas are obviously bad news for the viability of the Dresden Doctrine even though most analysts refuse to directly link the two topics.

“South Korea is currently holding war games with the U.S. Experiences tell us that it wouldn’t sit idly by,” said Prof. Yang Moo-jin at the University of North Korean Studies.

“We do not have to put too much weight on the current situation, which are by and large similar to the past.”

Shin In-kyun, head of the Korea Defense Network, agreed but he warned of any contingences.

“Basically I believe that the recent aggressions of the North would not affect the long-term implication of the Dresden proposal,” Shin said.

“However, things will be completely different if any accidents take place that claim the lives of people. Then, Seoul would have to forget about the declaration.”

In 2010, the North shelled the border island of Yeonpyeong, just south of the NLL, killing a total of four people including two civilians, plunging inter-Korean relations to their lowest point in recent years. By Kim Tae-gyu, The Korea Times