Why China remains cautious over prospects for breakthrough at Korean leaders’ peace summit
Kim Jong-un and Moon Jae-in’s meeting could help get long peace process off to a good start, but Beijing sees US-North Korea talks as key
China is remaining cautious about the outcome of Friday’s summit between North and South Korea as it is waiting to see whether the proposed talks between the US and Pyongyang lead to real progress, mainland analysts have said.
The meeting between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in the truce village of Panmunjom has the potential to get what is likely to prove a long and difficult process off to a good start, they said.
It will also serve China’s interests because Beijing would be happy to see the two sides starting a reconciliation process after the North’s nuclear and missile tests ramped up tensions on the peninsula in the past couple of years, Su Hao, a professor at China Foreign Affairs University, said.
China has close ties to both sides, with a treaty binding it into a military alliance with the North. Meanwhile the South is its third biggest trading partner (with an annual volume of US$280 billion in 2017), its second biggest destination for outbound investment and fourth biggest source of foreign investment.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said the meeting would help to “ease tensions on the peninsula as well as advancing regional peace and stability”.
However, China’s biggest concern is the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula and it remains to be seen if all parties can agree on what that will mean in practice.
