ID :
188320
Tue, 06/14/2011 - 06:47
Auther :
Shortlink :
https://oananews.org//node/188320
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S. Korea mulled FTA with N. Korea in 2007: ex-trade official
By Lee Chi-dong
WASHINGTON, June 13 (Yonhap) -- South Korea considered proposing a free trade agreement (FTA) with North Korea when they held summit talks in 2007, a former top trade official said Monday.
Kim Hyun-chong, who served as Seoul's trade minister from 2004-2007 and ambassador to the United Nations for the next two years, said he made the offer to then President Roh Moo-hyun in light of projected reunification costs.
"Back then, after completing free trade talks with the U.S., I suggested when the president was about to take his trip to Pyongyang that we do a North-South Korea free trade agreement," he said in a forum hosted by the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think tank.
Kim is an architect of Seoul's free trade policy on Washington. He initiated the KORUS FTA talks in 2006 and struck the deal the following year with Susan Schwab, who was U.S. trade representative at the time.
Kim did not elaborate on whether Roh actually proposed the bilateral FTA when he met with the North's leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang. The Roh-Kim talks, the second-ever inter-Korean summit, focused on economic cooperation coupled with tension-reducing measures between the two Koreas.
He said that he took into account natural resources in the North valued at some US$6.5 trillion, pointing out that Germany spent $2 trillion in reunification costs over the last 20 years.
Kim, now working as president and chief legal officer at Samsung Electronics, stressed that the KORUS FTA should be ratified despite controversy over the additional negotiations that took place last year.
In late 2010, Seoul and Washington resolved differences over auto trade through further discussions, which critics called re-negotiations that could damage the equilibrium achieved between the two parties in 2007.
"I think it should be ratified," Kim said adamantly, citing a "macro framework" in the face of competition with China and Japan.
He said the trade pact with the U.S. was not an end or objective itself but a process in which South Korea gained knowhow in order to jump to the next level of development.
lcd@yna.co.kr
leechidong@gmail.com
(END)
WASHINGTON, June 13 (Yonhap) -- South Korea considered proposing a free trade agreement (FTA) with North Korea when they held summit talks in 2007, a former top trade official said Monday.
Kim Hyun-chong, who served as Seoul's trade minister from 2004-2007 and ambassador to the United Nations for the next two years, said he made the offer to then President Roh Moo-hyun in light of projected reunification costs.
"Back then, after completing free trade talks with the U.S., I suggested when the president was about to take his trip to Pyongyang that we do a North-South Korea free trade agreement," he said in a forum hosted by the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think tank.
Kim is an architect of Seoul's free trade policy on Washington. He initiated the KORUS FTA talks in 2006 and struck the deal the following year with Susan Schwab, who was U.S. trade representative at the time.
Kim did not elaborate on whether Roh actually proposed the bilateral FTA when he met with the North's leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang. The Roh-Kim talks, the second-ever inter-Korean summit, focused on economic cooperation coupled with tension-reducing measures between the two Koreas.
He said that he took into account natural resources in the North valued at some US$6.5 trillion, pointing out that Germany spent $2 trillion in reunification costs over the last 20 years.
Kim, now working as president and chief legal officer at Samsung Electronics, stressed that the KORUS FTA should be ratified despite controversy over the additional negotiations that took place last year.
In late 2010, Seoul and Washington resolved differences over auto trade through further discussions, which critics called re-negotiations that could damage the equilibrium achieved between the two parties in 2007.
"I think it should be ratified," Kim said adamantly, citing a "macro framework" in the face of competition with China and Japan.
He said the trade pact with the U.S. was not an end or objective itself but a process in which South Korea gained knowhow in order to jump to the next level of development.
lcd@yna.co.kr
leechidong@gmail.com
(END)
