Jeers about Cheonan

North Korea should admit to brutal ship attack

South Korean singers successfully wound up their “Spring Comes” concerts in Pyongyang. The concerts were reciprocal performances to those given here by a North Korean art troupe during the PyeongChang Winter Olympics in February. These events displayed how important cultural exchanges are in thawing icy inter-Korean ties and promoting reconciliation of the divided nation.

Yet the Pyongyang concerts have left a bad aftertaste as one ranking North Korean official virtually jeered at the mention of the sinking of the South Korean Navy ship Cheonan, torpedoed by the North’s military on March 26, 2010, in the West Sea. His act certainly reflected the North’s continued refusal to admit to and apologize for its brutal provocation that claimed the lives of 46 South Korean sailors.

The official was Kim Yong-chol, head of the United Front Department at the North’s ruling Workers’ Party. He is the person widely suspected of having orchestrated the torpedo attack. At the time, he led the Reconnaissance General Bureau which the South held accountable for the Cheonan sinking.

The problem arose Monday when Kim offered an apology to visiting South Korean journalists for preventing them from covering Sunday’s concert in the East Pyongyang Grand Theatre. He jokingly introduced himself, saying “I’m Kim Yong-chol, the one who South Korea calls the main culprit for the sinking of the Cheonan.”

One may dismiss his remarks as only a joke. But we have to realize he was not joking, he was jeering at the tragedy. It could have been a carefully calculated act aimed at shirking his or the North’s culpability for the attack. This was backed up by the publication of an article in the Rodong Sinmun, the mouthpiece of the Workers’ Party, Tuesday, which claimed the Cheonan sinking was a fabrication by the South.

Some critics call on the liberal Moon Jae-in government not to overlook Kim’s remarks. They also suspect that his action could be aimed at preventing Seoul from demanding an apology from Pyongyang for the attack on the ship and other provocations, ahead of the April 27 inter-Korean summit. Other cases include the 2010 artillery assault of Yeonpyeong Island and the 2008 killing of a South Korean tourist at Mount Geumgang.

Regrettably, however, the Moon administration has refrained from taking any action, in an apparent bid to appease the Kim Jong-un regime before the summit. It is understandable that the government does not want to anger the North before the Moon-Kim meeting. And it is time for the two Koreas to move toward reconciliation and denuclearization of the peninsula. But we should not forget the North’s violent and brutal attack on the Cheonan.

In one way or another, Seoul needs to raise the issue at the summit or in other talks with Pyongyang down the road. Only after the North admits to its past provocations and apologizes for them can the divided nation take the path of peace, coexistence and co-prosperity.