New South Korean leader may shake things up
SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea elected Moon Jae-in, a human-rights lawyer who favors dialogue with North Korea, as president Tuesday, returning the nation’s liberals to power after nearly a decade in the political wilderness and setting up a potential rift with the United States over the North’s nuclear-weapons program.
His victory caps a remarkable national drama in which a corruption scandal, mass protests and impeachment forced a South Korean president from office for the first time in almost 60 years, leaving the conservative establishment in disarray and its former leader in jail.
Moon, 64, a son of North Korean refugees, faces the challenge of enacting changes to limit the power of big business and address the abuses uncovered in his predecessor’s downfall, while balancing relations with the United States and China and following through on his promise of a new approach to North Korea.
His election also scrambles the geopolitics over North Korea’s nuclear arsenal. Even as the Trump administration is urging the world to step up pressure on Pyongyang, it now faces the prospect of a critical ally — one with the most at stake in any conflict with the North — breaking ranks and adopting a more conciliatory approach.
Moon has argued that Washington’s reliance on sanctions and pressure has been ineffective and that it is time to give engagement and dialogue with the North another chance, an approach favored by China. He also has called for a review of the Pentagon’s deployment of an antimissile defense system in South Korea that the Chinese government has denounced.
In a nationally televised speech before cheering supporters, Moon declared that he would “be a president for all the people.” He said he would work with political rivals to create a country where “justice rules and common sense prevails.”
With all ballots counted this morning, Moon was in first place with 41 percent of the vote, according to the National Election Commission. He was followed by Hong Joon-pyo, a conservative who had pledged a tough stance against North Korea, with 24 percent, and Ahn Cheol-soo, a centrist, with 21 percent.
Moon will take office today.
Moon’s position on North Korea is a sharp departure from that of his two immediate predecessors, conservatives who tended to view anything less than strict enforcement of sanctions against the North as ideologically suspect.
While he condemned “the ruthless dictatorial regime of North Korea” during his campaign, Moon also argued that South Korea must “embrace the North Korean people to achieve peaceful reunification one day.”
“To do that, we must recognize Kim Jong Un as their ruler and as our dialogue partner,” he said. “The goal of sanctions must be to bring North Korea back to the negotiating table.”
David Straub, a former director of Korean affairs at the State Department and a senior fellow at the Sejong Institute, a research group near Seoul, warned of “serious policy differences” between the U.S. and the South Korean president over North Korea and related issues. He added that these differences could lead to “significantly increased popular dissatisfaction with the United States in South Korea.”
China, on the other hand, is likely to welcome Moon’s election, which may make it easier for it to deflect pressure from the United States to get tough on North Korea and strengthen its argument that Washington must address the North’s concerns about security.
Some analysts suggest Moon’s victory will lower the temperature of the North Korean standoff, prompting Washington and Pyongyang to pause and assess the effect of the new government in Seoul on their policies. Satellite images indicate the North has been preparing to conduct a sixth nuclear test, and the Trump administration has engaged in a heated campaign of implied threats and military posturing to stop it.