South Korea presidential race offers contrast on North
South Korea presidential race offers contrast on North
Paul Eckert, Reuters, Seoul
A weekend contest has narrowed South Korea's presidential election field to two candidates offering contrasting approaches on North Korea and threats posed by the communist state's pursuit of nuclear weapons.
The Dec. 19 election pits a liberal candidate vowing to continue outgoing President Kim Dae-jung's "Sunshine Policy" of embracing North Korea despite its nuclear arms quest against a conservative who has called for a tough stance against the North.
South Korea's 35 million voters will elect a successor to Kim in a contest expected to hinge mainly on domestic economic issues but played out in the shadow of North Korea's nuclear impasse with the United States and its allies.
Ruling party candidate Roh Moo-hyun promises continuity in South-North relations, which saw unprecedented exchanges including a summit of the rivals' leaders during Kim's five years in office.
His opponent, Lee Hoi-chang, has long been a critic of the Sunshine Policy. Echoing the United States, he has said he would suspend cash aid to the North over its nuclear program and demand more reciprocity for any future aid.
North Korea admitted to U.S. diplomats last month that it was secretly enriching uranium for weapons, despite pledges to Washington and the South that it had ended its atomic arms program.
On Sunday, Roh defeated South Korean soccer chief Chung Mong- joon in a last-minute primary election, based on polls that followed a televised policy debate. The two agreed to merge their campaigns after public opinion surveys showed that neither was likely to defeat Lee in a three-way contest.
South Korea joined the United States, Japan and the European Union in a decision this month to halt fuel oil aid shipments that North Korea had been receiving in exchange for freezing a plutonium-based nuclear weapons program in 1994.
On Monday, a North Korean official newspaper said the oil cut- off was "a very haughty and arrogant act of ditching the agreement recognized by the international community".
Candidates Roh and Lee have called on Pyongyang to scrap its nuclear arms, but their campaign platforms differ on tactics.
"If Lee gets elected, he will try to respond to North Korea's nuclear issue in a more direct way. If Roh gets elected, he will try to ease tensions in a more cooperative way," said political scientist Park Myung-lim of Yonsei University in Seoul.
Roh calls for the United States and North Korea to negotiate a deal to solve their nuclear dispute that would halt Pyongyang's nuclear arms program in exchange for international aid and changes in U.S. policies toward the communist government.