Dossier reveals chaos behind Koreas' early 1990s nuclear negotiations

Inter-Korean talks on the North Korean nuclear issue dissolved into shouting matches behind closed doors, with officials cutting each other off and hurling insults, according to newly declassified government records on the 1991-1993 nuclear negotiations on Tuesday.

The Ministry of Unification released the 3,836 pages of transcripts from 32 rounds of inter-Korean nuclear talks held between December 1991 and January 1993. The disclosure marked the ministry's eighth release of archival records on inter-Korean talks since May 2022.

At the center of these talks was the Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula signed by the two Koreas on Jan. 20, 1992.

Following the landmark agreement, North Korea said it would agree to accept inspections from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), while South Korea agreed to suspend Team Spirit, its annual military exercise with the United States.

Negotiations, however, proved challenging. A joint nuclear control commission, which was set to manage mutual inspections, quickly stalled as the sides disagreed with inspection methods, timelines and scope.

Seoul pushed for mutual pilot inspections of nuclear facilities on both sides, while Pyongyang wanted U.S. military bases in the South included in inspections and the joint military exercise halted first.

At a meeting on March 10, 1992, talks nearly broke down with officials talking over each other, shouting and throwing around insults, including "thug," causing the session to descend into chaos.

During a negotiation session in December that year, a South Korean official presented a photograph of North Korea's founder Kim Il-sung alongside Soviet Union leader Joseph Stalin.

The official presented it to emphasize his argument about who started the 1950-1953 Korean War. A North Korean official snatched the photo and tore it, before realizing, too late, what he had done. In the North, destroying an image of the country's leader is a grave transgression.

Twenty-two rounds of talks on mutual nuclear inspections yielded nothing. The failure, analysts said, largely came down to two things: North Korea's lack of sincerity and South Korea's lack of flexibility.

"North Korea insisted issues related to its own nuclear program should be discussed with the IAEA, not South Korea," said Park Yong-han, a senior research fellow at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses and a member of the Unification Ministry's committee overseeing the records release.

"The wide gap between the two sides made common ground impossible," he said.

Chung Seung-hoon, former head of the Inter-Korean Dialogue Headquarters, voiced regret over Seoul's adamant stance sticking to pressure on North Korea.

"The South demanded the North accept surprise inspections, including of its military bases, terms too coercive for Pyongyang to accept," he said. "Using only pressure as leverage without offering incentives was a weakness in our negotiating approach."

Yonhap