(3rd LD) Lee says inter-Korean summit likely this year

(ATTN: RECASTS first 9 paras; CHANGES headline)
By Lee Chi-dong
DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan. 29 (Yonhap) -- President Lee Myung-bak said Friday that
he may hold a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il sometime this year.

In an interview here with the British public broadcaster BBC, Lee said he is
"prepared to meet" Kim any time as part of efforts to ease tension on the Korean
Peninsula and resolve the North Korean nuclear problem.
"I can't say for sure it (the summit) will be held soon but I think I can meet
(Kim) within this year," Lee said, according to an audio file unofficially
released by BBC to the Korean Broadcasting System (KBS). Lee's comments on the
sensitive subject were not immediately available on the BBC's Web site, which
carried only a brief part of the interview on the president's views regarding the
global economy.
Spokeswoman of Cheong Wa Dae, presidential office, Kim Eun-hye confirmed Lee's
remarks.
"I think the two sides should have dialogue with their minds open to cooperation
and reconciliation," Lee added.
Lee's comments came amid rampant media speculation over the likelihood of an
inter-Korean summit this year.
High-level officials from the two Koreas reportedly had a preliminary meeting in
Singapore last year to guage the possibility of summit talks but it remains
unconfirmed whether any progress was made.
Some observers have construed Lee's latest remarks on the sensitive summit issue
as indicating that South and North Korea may be working to arrange a third
summit. The previous two rounds were held in Pyongyang in 2000 and 2007, focusing
on ways to reduce political tensions and promote bilateral economic cooperation.
The nuclear issue was not directly addressed during the meetings.
Cheong Wa Dae played down such analysis.
"President Lee's remarks were a reiteration of his basic position that an
inter-Korean summit is possible anytime if conditions are met," Lee Dong-kwan,
the president's top public relations secretary, said.
The South Korean government's stance remains firm: no meeting for the sake of
meeting and no talks to be used for political and tactical purposes, he stressed.
The official said there is "no concrete move currently underway for an
inter-Korean summit," but such a summit, if held, should produce "substantial and
tangible" results to help resolve the North Korean nuclear crisis. North Korea
argues that the nuclear crisis is a matter between Pyongyang and Washington and
is unrelated to the South.
With regard to the North's latest provocations near a disputed sea border in the
Yellow Sea, meanwhile, the South's leader said, "It is not desirable for North
Korea to make this kind of threat."
It was his first official response to the North's firing of artillery shells
towards a South Korea island near the Northern Limit Line earlier this week in
what it claimed was part of standard military training.
The president said North Korea, under growing pressure to rejoin the six-party
nuclear talks, might be trying to put pressure on South Korea to resume
inter-Korean dialogue.
"Or, it may be a strategic move aimed at signing a peace treaty," he said.
The North has been demanding talks among "relevant parties" to replace the
armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War with a formal peace treaty.
The president pointed out the North is trying to get out of its economic
difficulty, deepened by the U.N. sanctions, through a gesture of dialogue, not
the abandonment of its nuclear program.
"North Korea is still using the past strategy of buying time and delaying a
resolution to the nuclear issue. But the North's strategy won't be accepted by
the international community any more," Lee said.
He also defended controversial comments by Defense Minister Kim Tae-young that
the South may launch a pre-emptive strike against North Korea in case of signs of
a nuclear attack.
Kim told a local defense forum that his military "would have to strike (North
Korea) right away" if the North showed clear indications of an imminent nuclear
attack against the South. North Korea strongly criticized Kim's stance, calling
it a "declaration of war."
The president said the defense minister was not referring to any specific
situation but was simply talking about a general military theory.
Lee said the communist neighbor appears not to be on the verge of collapse
despite some media reports of growing political instability there partly due to
the illness of its leader Kim Jong-il.
Lee said Kim's health seems to have recovered somewhat, adding the North's
economic difficulty is not a new situation.
"We would have to prepare for the worst scenario but we do not think the collapse
of North Korea is imminent," he said.
On the global economy, Lee reiterated his opposition to an early "exit strategy."
With the world's economy on track to a recovery, global leaders are contemplating
the timing of rolling back massive stimulus packages used to deal with the
2008-09 economic crisis.
"In history, we witnessed (the fact) that a hasty exit strategy may cause a
double dip," said Lee, who is on a trip to the Swiss city of Davos to attend the
annual meeting of World Economic Forum. Lee is attending the conference as the
leader of a country holding this year's presidency of the G-20 global economic
summit.
Lee, a former business CEO, said the world economy is unlikely to go into a
double dip as many countries are cautious about implementing such an exit
strategy.
He said South Korea also plans to maintain its current fiscal policy in the first
half of this year and it will focus more efforts on boosting civilian-led
investment in the latter half. "The government has limits on what it can do," he
said.
The G-20 summit meeting will be held in Canada in June and in South Korea in
November.
lcd@yna.co.kr
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