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S.Korea's Kim Looks to Build on Warm Summit Start
Buoyed by an overwhelming welcome in the North Korean capital, South Korean President Kim Dae-jung will be hoping on Wednesday to translate the goodwill into concrete actions to ease tensions on the divided peninsula.
Top of the South Korean leader's wish list is an agreement to permit some of the seven million South Koreans with relatives or ancestors in the North to hold reunions with family members they have not seen during half a century of Cold War.
"Many of the family members are passing away due to their advanced age; we have to attend to their life-long wishes," Kim said in a banquet speech on Tuesday at the end of a first day of talks that went more smoothly than he could have dared hope.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-il had set the tone by showing up in person to greet his visitor, who became the first South Korean leader to set foot on the North's soil.
The two men seemed edgy at first but before long the smiles grew more frequent. An unexpected shared limousine ride into Pyongyang gave them the chance to break the ice away from prying eyes, and by the time they reached the Baekhwawon State Guest House they were cracking jokes.
Kim Jong-il, his paunch betraying a healthy appetite, asked his guest why he had eaten only half a soft-boiled egg for breakfast.
"I did so because I knew I would have a good meal when I got to Pyongyang," Kim Dae-jung replied to laughter.
In a display of choreographed spontaneity that only an authoritarian regime could manage, as many as one million cheering North Koreans had lined the streets leading into Pyongyang to catch a glimpse of the two Kims opening a new chapter in Korea's turbulent history.
The South Korean leader told his host he was tremendously moved by the welcome, especially as he had not expected to be able to make a visit so soon to the North, which has shown increasingly urgent signs in recent months of wanting to end its self-imposed isolation from the outside world.
In a reply larded with ambiguity, Kim Jong-il replied: "I will try not to be too proud. And you will not be disappointed."
The warm tone of the exchanges fuelled already high hopes in South Korea, where the summit blanketed the country's television channels, that a deal was in the air that could transform relations with its awkward neighbour to the North.
Kim has brought with him senior executives from some of his country's leading companies, as well as his finance minister, in case he needs to discuss concrete aid and investment projects.
The South Korean said the mountain of tasks facing the two Koreas had to be tackled practically, one at a time, and suggested tackling transport problems first.
He proposed reopening blocked road and rail connections and opening new North-South sea lanes and air routes between the South and the North.
"When that happens, all Koreans will be able to travel freely between the two sides and work toward reconciliation, cooperation and eventual reunification," he said.
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