The Straits Times
16 April 2018
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- Kim Jong Un – a Master Chess Player in Diplomacy?
Kim Jong Un – a Master Chess Player in Diplomacy?
With several deftly calculated moves, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has got the major powers exactly where he wants them. To woo Seoul, he sent his sister to the Winter Olympics hosted by the South. He also made his first trip out of the country and met Chinese President Xi Jinping. He even offered to denuclearise, to draw the United States into dialogue.
Dr Graham Ong-Webb, research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore, told ST that Mr Kim is seeking to “achieve complete consolidation of his power” by becoming the first North Korean leader to meet a sitting US president.
He added: “Mr Kim Jong Un clearly understands the power of perception, and knows that optically, this will be seen as a meeting of equals in the eyes of his own people… (It is) extremely valuable because it affirms their identity as a sovereign nation.
“In meeting with the current leader of the world’s incumbent superpower, Mr Kim achieves the double effect of strengthening his national authority and establishing North Korea as a ‘normal’ country.”
Dr Ong-Webb believes Mr Kim pushed hard on missile tests and then swung equally hard towards dialogue and denuclearisation to “entice the egotistical businessman in President Trump, in the run-up to the mid-term elections, to take no chances in using his office to close the deal”.
But he warned that promises to denuclearise could be nothing but a bluff as Mr Kim “cannot run away from the Byungjin policy he has advanced”.
GPO / IDSS / Online / Print
Last updated on 17/04/2018
