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Korea for Koreans: fresh reflections on the Pyongyang summit.

Article Excerpt
The Roh Moo Hyun-Kim Jong Il inter-Korean summit of early October has predictably drawn mixed reviews. Many South Koreans have welcomed the wide-ranging agreements under the October 4 declaration, especially the prospects for expanded reunions of divided families, tourism, economic and cultural exchanges, steps toward coexistence and peace, and the like. Others, while being warm toward those goals, have looked askance at the heavy cost to the southern taxpayers of the planned infrastructure development projects in the north, especially railways, highways, and ports. Some, particularly the diehard anti-communists and opponents of the unpopular Roh, have seen the summit as nothing but an attempt on his part to shore up his legacy to history and as a nefarious ploy on the part of Kim to strengthen his repressive regime by extorting more aid from the south without giving anything in return on political reform and human rights. Still others have given the whole event a big yawn and criticized it as an exercise in tiresome platitudes which are not likely to change the ground-level reality very much in the near future.

It may be instructive to go beyond these reactions and grasp the...

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