Kim Jong Un’s sister returns to North Korea after three days
Associated Press
GANGNEUNG, South Korea — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister headed home Sunday night after a whirlwind three days in South Korea, where she sat among world dignitaries at the Olympics and tossed a diplomatic offer to the South aimed at ending seven decades of hostility.
Kim Yo Jong and the rest of the North Korean delegation departed for Pyongyang on her brother’s private jet, a day after they delivered his hopes for a summit with South Korean President Moon Jae-in during a lunch at Seoul’s presidential palace. It was a sharp, but possibly fleeting, contrast with many months of rising tensions connected to the North’s continued development of nuclear weapons and longrange missiles.
They capped their final day in South Korea by joining Mr. Moon at a Seoul concert given by a visiting North Korean art troupe led by the head of an immensely pop band.
Accepting North Korea’s demand to transport more than 100 members of the art troupe by sea, South Korea treated the Mangyongbong92 ferry as an exemption to the maritime sanctions it imposed on the North, a controversial move amid concerns that the North is trying to use the Olympics to poke holes in international sanctions.
Kim Yo Jong, 30, is an increasingly prominent figure inher brother’s government and the first member of the North’s ruling family to visit the South since the end ofthe 1950-53 Korean War.
“Honestly, I didn’t know I would come here so suddenly. I thought things would be strange and very different, but I found a lot of things being similar,” Kim Yong Nam said while proposing a toast at Sunday’s dinner, according to Mr. Moon’s office. “Here’s to hoping that we could see the pleasant people [of the South] again in Pyeongchang and bring closer the future where we are one again.”
Though Mr. Moon used the Olympics to resurrect meaningful communication with North Korea after a diplomatic stalemate over its nuclear program, he didn’t immediately jump on the North Korean offer for a summi, instead saying the Koreas should create an appropriate environment for it first. He also called for the need of a quick resumption of dialogue between North Korea and the United States.
At the opening ceremony at Pyeongchang’s Olympic Stadium Friday, Vice President Mike Pence and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seemed to go out of their way to not acknowledge the North Koreans despite sitting just few feet away.