President of CSIS John Hamre,
President of CIIS(China Institute of International Studies) Su Ge,
And all distinguished participants from Korea, the U.S., and China,
Ladies and Gentleman

The reason that delegations from the three countries convened today is not irrelevant to the recent situation on the Korean Peninsula.
As I watched North Korea conduct its fourth nuclear test last January, I was worried that the international society’s efforts to block North Korea’s nuclear development, which have been under way for the last quarter century, may ultimately result in a failure.
The fact that the test was administered successfully implies that we have almost run out of time to prevent North Korea’s nuclear missile units from actually being deployed.

The adoption of the UNSC Resolution 2270 on North Korea, which contains the toughest and most effective sanction measures in past two decades of UN history, was made possible due to our sense of crisis regarding the North Korean nuclear problem, and our recognition of the importance of a strong international cooperation system.
This is also the reason why three delegations from Korea, the U.S., and China convened today.
Active international cooperation is crucial to preventing North Korea’s nuclear armament.

Only if we establish a sanctions regime that is strong enough to threaten the safety of the North Korean regime will North Korea consider the option of surrendering its nuclear program.
We are all well aware of the fact that imposing sanctions is not an easy process.
Of course, our goal is not the sanctions themselves, but to denuclearize North Korea. Sanctions are the means through which we can denuclearize North Korea.

Dialogue with North Korea could resume at some point in the future. However, the international sanctions regime should be maintained in consistent form. The key to the solution of the North Korean nuclear problem is whether it will be possible to maintain a strong and effective international sanctions regime until denuclearization is achieved.
We should make it clear that if North Korea continues to hold onto its nuclear weapons, it will have to bear strategic costs to the extent that they can threaten its regime safety. This is, without doubt, the most important precondition for making progress in dialogue with North Korea.

Lately, North Korea has been threatening South Korea in a highly blatant and uncontrolled manner.
Kim Jong-un has declared that he would launch a preemptive nuclear strike against the South, as well as the United States and has confirmed his words by conducting various missile tests involving Scud, Rodong and recently Musudan ballistic missiles using mobile launchers.

Recently, he has even disclosed a map that pinpoints his main targets in South Korea, including the nuclear power plants, in the process of directing the missile tests.
Seoul, which is located 30km away from the Military Demarcation Line, is the place where my family and I live.
Our friends from the U.S. and China will find it difficult to understand the complex feelings and a distinctive sense of anxiety that are shared only among Koreans.
Our only source of comfort is that Kim Jong-un has the habit of making empty threats, but we are still uncertain about how long we should rely on the hope that Kim Jong-un is a crying wolf.

Another possibility that we must not overlook, which I hate to admit, is that North Korea’s nuclear missile units, armed with Scud, Rodong, and Musudan missiles targeting Seoul. Beijing, Tokyo and Guam, may have already been deployed, excluding the ICBMs that require more time due to warhead re-entry.

Currently, the most urgent task for us is to obtain credible deterrence against North Korea.
Only if we succeed in building strong and reliable deterrence capabilities will we become able to solve the North Korean nuclear problem in the mid to long term.
Without credible deterrence, our policy toward North Korea is bound to result in a failure.
Developing strong and reliable deterrence capabilities is both the starting point and basis for solving the North Korean nuclear problem through peaceful means.
To be honest, some South Koreans argue that South Korea should develop its own nuclear weapons in order to ward off threats from North Korea, while some stress the need to bring in tactical nuclear weapons from the U.S.
However, South Korea is officially a nuclear-free state, and has been persistently abiding by the Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, signed between the two Koreas in 1992.
What South Korea wants is denuclearization, rather than a balance of terror generated by nuclear weapons.
Thus, South Korea needs to build “non-nuclear deterrence” capabilities will never become a threat to its neighboring countries.

Besides the strong international cooperation system and credible deterrence, there is another factor that is essential to solving the North Korean nuclear problem. That is, we should change the nature of the North Korean regime so that it can become less obsessed with nuclear weapons. In other words, we need to bring about regime transformation in North Korea.
As nighttime satellite photography suggests, in a country that even lacks the energy for powering a light bulb the regime has been spending a huge amount of money on developing nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
North Korea is the only country in the world that has officially declared itself as a nuclear-armed country in its constitution.
Nuclear weapons can never guarantee the safety of the North Korean regime.
From my point of view, North Korea currently stands at a crossroad of regime transformation.

In order to bring about regime transformation in North Korea and make it become a normal state that carries out reforms and opens up its economy, which is a desirable outcome for everybody, coordinated efforts by the international community and cooperation among R.O.K, the U.S., and China are necessary.