The Rebuilding Korea Party called on the South Korean government to take a more active mediating role to bring about a summit between the United States and North Korea, arguing that Seoul must both persuade Washington and create an opening for Pyongyang to come to the table.
"The South Korean government must persuade the United States to put forward concrete proposals that North Korea can actually review and respond to — on when and how to begin talks," Kim Joon-hyung, the party's floor leader, said at a general meeting of lawmakers at the National Assembly on the 1st. "At the same time, we must create the rationale and the point of contact that would allow North Korea to respond."
"President Lee Jae-myung said that for peace on the Korean Peninsula, we must thread even the eye of a needle. Now is exactly the time to thread that needle," Kim said. "President Donald Trump has stated several times, through social media and the press, his intention to meet with State Affairs Commission Chairman Kim Jong-un. But that has not yet gone beyond a stated desire to meet and become a concrete, formal offer of talks directed at North Korea."
Kim called the current moment a "golden time," warning that "if we miss this chance, there is no telling when it will come again. It could be the last one." He added: "What is clear is that a pacemaker is not someone who stands behind clapping and waiting, but someone who clears the way so the runner can finish the race. The government must press Washington more actively, even behind the scenes. It should send a special envoy, and it should move China and Russia as well."
"The National Assembly, too, cannot simply stand and watch as if it were a fire across the river," he said. "The ruling and opposition parties should together throw their weight behind resuming U.S.-North Korea dialogue and pursue active parliamentary diplomacy with the U.S. Congress and political circles."
Separately, Rep. Hwang Un-ha told the same meeting that the party proposes creating a deputy prime minister post to handle housing and real estate under the Lee Jae-myung administration. Pointing to real estate as the reason behind the decline in the president's approval rating, Hwang said a newly created deputy prime minister is needed to take responsibility for housing stability and a fair property market.
