Moon Jae-in is eager for the Korea-US-North Korea "show"

South Korean President Moon Jae-in. Photo: AP

South Korean officials say the three-way meeting will only take place if it is supported by the outcome of the Pyongyang-Washington summit. The South Korean president said he hoped such a meeting could take place soon after the Trump-Kim meeting scheduled for June 12 in Singapore.

Moon Jae-in is eager for the Korea-US-North Korea “show”. Photo: Getty

A meeting between the three leaders could serve as a first step toward President Moon achieving his long-sought goal: a peace treaty formally ending the Korean War.

Experts say the Moon administration sees a declaration of a peace treaty as an incentive for North Korea to agree to denuclearization, but they also say it is a personal matter for Moon, the son of North Korean refugees.

“If there is a formal declaration of an end to the Korean War, it will open a path to peace on the Korean Peninsula. So Moon wants to declare an end to the war as soon as possible,” said Kim Yong-hyun, a professor of North Korean studies at Dongguk University in Seoul.

However, according to two sources familiar with Washington's current negotiating strategy, the Trump administration is divided on whether agreeing to a peace treaty at the outset of negotiations would be tantamount to giving Pyongyang a significant concession in the negotiations.

A senior Seoul government official said that both President Moon and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe were “eager” to play some role in the negotiations, but that desire has since given way to the goal of keeping the Trump-Kim meeting as originally planned since last week.

“The president is trying to distance himself from them,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Trump’s theory is that he can build a better relationship with Kim without Abe and Moon and then get the assurances he needs in a one-on-one format.”

If the US and South Korea decide to invite South Korea, President Moon could arrive in Singapore as early as the afternoon of June 13, according to sources close to the matter. This would allow Trump and Kim to discuss key issues at their meeting on June 12 and allow Moon to be in Seoul on June 13, when local elections will be held in South Korea.

South Korea has dispatched an official to Singapore to prepare plans for the Shangri-La Dialogue, which begins on June 1. These preparations could also help in part with a possible three-way meeting with Trump and Kim, according to a source.

At the inter-Korean meeting on April 27, the two leaders Moon and Kim agreed to “actively pursue” three-way talks with the US or four-way talks with the participation of China, to turn the 1953 armistice agreement into a permanent peace treaty.

In the Panmunjom Declaration signed by Moon and Kim, the two leaders agreed that “ending the current state of war and establishing a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula is a historic mission that cannot be delayed any longer.”

Some analysts are skeptical that agreeing to a peace treaty would make much of a difference. Chun Yung-woo, a former South Korean national security adviser and nuclear negotiator with North Korea, said the armistice signed 65 years ago was only a declaration of a de facto end to the war.

A formal declaration at the three-way summit would be “nothing more than a political commitment to a peace treaty as part of a denuclearization agreement. It cannot play a role in narrowing the differences on denuclearization between the US and North Korea,” Chun said.

Commenting on President Moon’s role in the trilateral meeting, Chun said: “Even if Moon wants to play some role in any agreement that may come out of the Trump-Kim meeting, he still risks being seen as an ‘extra’ eager to play a role in the Trump-Kim show.”

Declaring an end to the war could serve as a first step toward normalizing North Korea's relations with the United States and pave the way for a peace treaty that would see U.S. troops leave the Korean Peninsula at some point, said Duyeon Kim, a senior research fellow at the Korean Peninsula Future Forum in Seoul.

Earlier this week, Moon expressed hope to pursue a three-way meeting if the US-North Korea summit goes ahead as planned. However, he has since tried to suppress speculation about his plans.

According to researcher Duyeon Kim, in the context of the still large differences between the US and North Korea surrounding the issue of denuclearization, it is still too early to say whether a three-way summit can take place. “A three-way meeting is an ambitious effort, but we will wait and see”./.