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ROK should not be swayed by Sino-US conflicts
By Yang Moo-jin
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In keeping with the ancient Greek tradition of suspending hostilities, the United Nations has had the practice of adopting the Olympic Truce Resolution since 1993.
We have the experience of creating a spring of peace on the Korean Peninsula with the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics as an opportunity. Kim Yo-jong, vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party, attended the opening ceremony of the PyeongChang Winter Olympics and visited Cheong Wa Dae as a special envoy to deliver a letter from Chairman Kim Jong-un to President Moon Jae-in. The momentum created in PyeongChang led to the inter-Korean summit and the U.S.-North Korea summit, dramatically demonstrating that the Olympics can contribute to peace.
When President Moon Jae-in proposed a declaration to bring a formal end to the Korean War in September last year, there were expectations that the Beijing Winter Olympics could be a good opportunity to resume the peace process for the Korean Peninsula, including the end-of-war declaration.
However, an atmosphere of peace and harmony is hardly being formed even at this point, about a month ahead of the Beijing Winter Olympics. The long-term pandemic of COVID-19 and diplomatic boycott by the U.S. due to the U.S.-China conflict are having a significant impact.
The Moon Jae-in administration is not giving up hope and it is committed to making every effort to use the Beijing Winter Olympics as an opportunity to advance peace on the Korean Peninsula.
However, recently, former high-ranking U.S. officials and military commanders who worked in South Korea have been pouring out remarks that go against the expectations of the South Korean government and aggravate regional conflicts, undermining the purpose of the Olympic Truce Resolution adopted by the U.N. General Assembly.
Former U.S. Forces Korea Commander General Robert Abrams and former U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Harry Harris expressed strong doubts about the South Korean government's intention to declare an end to the war. The end-of-war declaration is an agenda that has been discussed to a considerable extent between the U.S. and North Korea even during the Trump administration, and it is known that coordination between the South Korean and U.S. governments is almost complete.
The remarks of the former ambassador to South Korea and the military commander, who should be a symbol of ROK-U.S. cooperation and friendship that disparage the Moon Jae-in administration's last effort to end the abnormal and unstable armistice that has lasted for 69 years are of no help to the ROK-U.S. relationship.
Also, General Abrams and former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs David Stilwell said that the new ROK-U.S. combined operational planning should include countermeasures against China, as well as North Korea. The operational planning of ROK-U.S. alliance is basically designed to contain North Korea's threat more effectively and counter it, if necessary.
Including countermeasures against China in operational planning virtually means that the U.S. and South Korea see China as their enemy and therefore must counter militarily to its threat. This asks South Korea to thrust itself to the forefront of strategic competition between the U.S. and China, which is a dangerous position that is only in the strategic interests of the U.S. while turning away from South Korea's traditional position. South Korean Defense Ministry spokesperson immediately responded with displeasure to Abrams' remarks, noting that he did not know why Abrams said that.
China supports South Korea's push for an end-of-war declaration and is of the view that the declaration contributes to promoting peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula. Furthermore, China emphasizes a political solution to the Korean Peninsula issues through dialogue.
However, China must look at whether its neighbors see its actual behaviors as a threat. China carried out excessive retaliation against South Korea in response to deployment of Washington's THAAD anti-missile defense system, and Chinese military planes frequently fly into South Korea's air defense identification zone.
The ROK government said a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics was not under discussion, ignoring the pressure to join the diplomatic boycott spearheaded by the U.S. As a host country of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, South Korea takes a view that it has a moral duty to help the Beijing Winter Olympics become peaceful.
It was, in the end, the proper response that the Korean government was not swayed by the U.S.-China conflict and stood firmly by a consistent principle to work toward bringing about peace on the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asia by utilizing the upcoming Olympics. Despite its decision not to send athletes, North Korea should join South Korea's diplomatic efforts.
Intensification of the U.S.-China strategic competition will become the challenge in handling a peace process on the Korean Peninsula for many years to come. South Korea should hold fast to its balanced and practical position to not be involved in the U.S.-China conflict, while seeking an active role to help denuclearization and create peace on the Korean Peninsula, which should also be included in the U.S.-China cooperation area.
The Beijing Winter Olympics is also the end of the Olympic relay in Northeast Asia from 2018 PyeongChang and 2020 Tokyo to 2022 Beijing. There is a prediction that it's going to be hard to improve inter-Korea relations during the Beijing Winter Olympics, and the U.S.-China conflict has added uncertainties to the situation on the Korean Peninsula.
We must all try to prepare to improve inter-Korea relations again through the Beijing Winter Olympics, encouraging Northeast Asia to move forward toward the path of peace and prosperity.
Yang Moo-jin (yangmj@kyungnam.ac.kr) is a professor at the University of North Korean Studies and vice chairman of the Korean Association of North Korean Studies. He is also a standing committee member of the National Unification Advisory Council and policy consultant at the Ministry of Unification.
Seeking justice in today's China continues to be hopeless
By Kim Sang-woo
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The Biden administration highlighted what Washington says is a genocide against minority Muslims in China's Xinjiang. "U.S. diplomatic or official representation would treat these games as business as usual in the face of China's egregious human rights abuses and atrocities in Xinjiang, and we simply can't do that," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at a daily press conference.
China's embassy in Washington called the boycott a "political manipulation" that would have no impact on the Games. The Chinese Mission to the U.N. in a statement said, "The U.S. just wants to politicize sports, create divisions and provoke confrontation … This approach will find no support and is doomed to fail."
Since the International Olympic Committee awarded Beijing the games, human rights organizations reported that Beijing's attack on the Uyghur community are alarming in severity and constitute "crimes against humanity," including "forced sterilization, sexual violence, enslavement, torture, forced transfer, persecution, and imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty."
"We have to start from the premise that Beijing should never have gotten the games to begin with, if we had known what we know now," says Michael Abramowitz, the head of Freedom House, which tracks the global status of human rights and democracy.
Even beyond the Uyghur horrors, suppression of democratic freedom in Hong Kong and cultural repression in Tibet, there is a more immediate sports issue that makes it impossible not to protest these games.
Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai has disappeared for weeks after accusing a former top Chinese Communist Party official of sexual assault. If China can simply "disappear" a sports star who angers party leaders ― as it has disappeared so many others who have challenged the party ― how can the democratic world ignore such a crime?
Protests by the Women's Tennis Association have belatedly focused international attention on Beijing's practice of disappearing prominent individuals.
Beijing's efforts to give Peng the appearance of freedom demonstrate its sensitivity to the growing international pressure: A U.N. human rights official has called for a full and transparent investigation. The White House press secretary said the Biden administration is "deeply concerned."
Only the IOC, openly worried that plans for the Beijing Olympics in February could "spin out of control," has been able to speak with Peng, but only for a suspiciously limited conversation that has generated international outrage. But even with increasing international pressure, it seems unlikely that Beijing will change. Seeking justice in today's China continues to be as hopeless as "throwing an egg against a stone."
Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the Chinese government has denied any systematic crimes against its people, claiming that these are internal affairs and that critics are violating its sovereignty.
Diplomats from countries attending the Beijing Olympics will be lending their consent to the abuses. This is a conscience issue that touches on the essence of our humanity.
Bonnie Glaser, a China expert at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, told a congressional hearing on Dec. 7 last year that unless other countries join the boycott it will undermine the message that China's human rights abuses are unacceptable. "Now I think the only option really that is available to us is to try to get as many countries as we can to stand with us in this coalition," Glaser said.
President Moon Jae-in of South Korea said during his visit to Australia that his government was "not considering" the boycott. They haven't "received any requests from any countries, including the United States, to participate." However, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had said that allies were consulted on a "shared approach."
It appears that U.S. allies are divided over the Biden administration's diplomatic boycott.
France is sending diplomats to Beijing, saying it opposes using sports competitions to highlight human rights concerns. South Korea is not taking part in the diplomatic boycott of the Games citing its cooperation with China over North Korea, in a sharp break with the U.S. However, China's cooperation has made no progress so far, and instead North Korea has fired a suspected ballistic missile into the sea on Jan. 5, violating U.N. resolutions.
Meanwhile the European Union has yet to make a final decision on how to approach the Games with member nations on opposite sides of the debate. Norway is planning to send both its diplomats and athletes to Beijing. Japan will not send diplomats, while New Zealand said its diplomats won't attend due to the pandemic.
A month has passed since the Summit for Democracy, and 2022 is the "year of action." The decision to boycott the Beijing Winter Olympic Games is democracies taking action to send a clear message about the Chinese government's role in human rights abuses.
The IOC has avoided taking sides, instead highlighting the fact that athletes are eligible to attend. "You will hear the same comment from us for every political decision from any government," IOC President Thomas Bach said.
"It's never easy to do what is morally right, especially when there are conflicting and competing political and economic interests involved. However, to protect democratic values and prevent further backsliding of global democracy we must practice what we preach, based on the simple truth: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
Kim Sang-woo (swkim54@hotmail.com) is a former lawmaker and is currently chairman of the East Asia Cultural Project. He is also a member of the board of directors at the Kim Dae-jung Peace Foundation.
