Unification Minister Jeong Dong-young attends a plenary session of the National Assembly's Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee on Wednesday to deliver a ministry briefing. [Yonhap]
Unification Minister Jeong Dong-young attends a plenary session of the National Assembly's Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee on Wednesday to deliver a ministry briefing. [Yonhap]

Unification Minister Jeong Dong-young on Wednesday formally expressed support for Donald Trump's order to scale back joint South Korea-US military exercises, calling it a decision aimed at securing lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula.

Speaking at a plenary session of the National Assembly's Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee, Jeong secured time for additional remarks from committee chairman Song Seok-jun after the morning question-and-answer session concluded. "President Trump's order to reduce the scale of combined South Korea-US exercises stems from deep consideration for peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula," Jeong said. "The Ministry of Unification shares his view on this decision."

Jeong added that the shared goal of the South Korea-US alliance is "peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula," and said Trump's own phrase — that he is "making the situation much safer" — goes to the heart of the decision to scale back the drills.

He went on to say he hopes "this reduction in combined exercises will develop into meaningful dialogue between the United States and North Korea, and extend further to an improvement in inter-Korean relations."

Earlier in the same session, Jeong offered an optimistic outlook on the prospects for resuming US-North Korea talks. He said Pyongyang has repeatedly identified the combined military exercises as the core of what it calls Washington's hostile policy, and said Trump's order to curtail large-scale drills could serve as an opening to restart stalled negotiations.

Meanwhile, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un signaled conditional openness to improving relations with the United States at the ninth Workers' Party congress held in February. Kim said that if the US respects the current status of North Korea as enshrined in its constitution and withdraws its hostile policy, "there is no reason we cannot get along well with America."


sunpine@heraldcorp.com