A project to import Russian gas to South Korea via North Korea could be a valuable economic and political tool that fosters more economic cooperation between the two Koreas.
On Thursday, South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who took office in May, addressed the Korber Foundation in Berlin. He talked about the path towards a peaceful Korean peninsula and stressed that greater economic cooperation with North Korea is an important foundation to the establishment of peace there.
Jae-in, who is affiliated to the South Korean Democratic Party, said that he has planned a “new economic map for the Korean Peninsula,” which will be put into action if there is progress on the North Korean nuclear issue.
The plan includes a fresh connection between the South and the North across the military demarcation line, an “economic belt” which would “establish an economic community where the two Koreas prosper together,” the Korea Herald reported Jae-in as saying.
“The severed inter-Korean railway will be connected again. A train departing from Busan and Mokpo will run through Pyongyang and Beijing, and head towards Russia and Europe. Cooperation projects in Northeast Asia, such as the gas pipeline project connecting the two Koreas and Russia, may also be implemented.”
“South and North Korea will prosper together as a bridging country connecting the Asian mainland and the Pacific. The South and the North need only to implement the Oct. 4 Declaration together. Then the world will see a new economic model of an economy of peace and co-prosperity,” the South Korean President said.
Back in 2008, Moscow and Seoul reached a preliminary agreement on the delivery of Russian gas and negotiations with North Korea…