Status: 07/27/2021 6:49 a.m.
The lines were cut for more than a year – now North and South Korea are officially approaching again. The two heads of state have apparently been writing each other since April.
After months of interruption, North and South Korea have reopened their official communication channels. The South Korean presidential office and North Korean state media announced today – on the 68th anniversary of the signing of the armistice agreement to end the Korean War.
According to the information, South Korean President Moon Jae and North Korean ruler Kim Jong Un have been exchanging personal letters since April. The aim is to improve relationships, and the re-establishment of communication links is now the first step in that direction.
Communication cut in June 2020
North Korea unilaterally cut all communication channels between the governments and the military in both countries in June last year. The communist government in Pyongyang reacted to propaganda actions by South Korean activists and North Korean refugees on the border, which were directed against the leadership in North Korea. Seoul was accused of not doing anything about the actions. The hotline between the presidential office in Seoul and the office of the North Korean ruler was also affected by the North Korean measure. North Korea later also blew up an inter-Korean liaison office in the border town of Kaesong.
All Koreans wanted bilateral relations to recover from the setbacks “as soon as possible,” the North Korean state media said. The top leaders have agreed to restore mutual trust and promote reconciliation by “restoring separate lines of communication within Korea”.
North Korea is internationally isolated because of its nuclear weapons program. As a result of the failed summit meeting between Kim Jong Un and former US President Donald Trump in Vietnam in February 2019, inter-Korean relations also stopped moving. Trump and Kim could not agree on a roadmap for the disarmament of the North Korean nuclear program, as well as on consideration from the US.