Hong Hyun-ik "Now We Must Focus on China and Russia... No Unification Without Cooperation with China"

Hong Hyun-ik, the last president of the Korea National Diplomatic Academy under the Moon Jae-in administration, raised his voice saying, "Peaceful unification is impossible without China's cooperation," emphasizing that it is now time to pay attention to China and Russia.

On the 22nd, former President Hong said on KBS's "Choi Kyung-young's Strongest Current Affairs," "At this point, relations with the United States and Japan are sufficient."

Hong Hyun-ik, Former President of the Korea National Diplomatic Academy

President Yoon Suk-yeol is solidifying Korea-US-Japan relations through Korea-Japan and Korea-US-Japan summits on the occasion of the recent G7 summit, but attention should also be turned to China and Russia.

Former President Hong said, "The main content of the Korea-US-Japan summit is to strengthen cooperation on the North Korean nuclear issue, and what I find somewhat uneasy is that cooperation in the Indo-Pacific strategy mainly aims to check China, Russia, and North Korea and to promote friendly relations among the three countries of Korea, the US, and Japan," adding, "There is a saying, 'Excess is as bad as deficiency.' Too much is worse than too little." He pointed out that there is an excessive bias toward the US and Japan.

Referring to the recent mention by Unification Minister Kwon Young-se about "improving relations with China," he said, "Not only for unification but also to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, establish a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula, and properly manage and respond to any sudden major incidents in North Korea, it is almost impossible without China's cooperation," adding, "Now is the time to pay attention to China and Russia. That time has come."

Regarding Japan's discharge of contaminated water, he evaluated it as "40% successful." Former President Hong said, "At the G7, there was also an environment ministers' meeting, where the Japanese minister said, 'Thank you for welcoming the discharge like this,' and then the German environment minister said, 'We have never supported the discharge. We only recognized the credibility of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),'" adding, "We support the thorough verification process conducted by the IAEA. Because of that, it is about 40% successful."