Wang Yi in Seoul to Back Korean Peace Initiative
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- Wang Yi made his first visit to Seoul in five years beginning Aug. 18, meeting Foreign Minister Cho Hyun, President Lee Jae Myung, and national security adviser Wi Sung-lac over two days.
- Lee Jae Myung proposed multilateral talks with "directly involved parties"—widely understood to mean the two Koreas, the United States, and China—to formally end the 1950-53 Korean War and establish a peace regime.
- Trump is seeking to revive personal diplomacy with Kim Jong Un, saying he plans to meet the North Korean leader later this year and reduce US-South Korea joint military exercises.
- Wang Yi told South Korea's national security adviser the "fundamental way" to ease tensions was to "eliminate the root causes" and urged Washington to drop its "hostile policy" toward Pyongyang.
- The Korean War remains technically unresolved, ending only in an armistice; the most recent peace push, the 2018 Panmunjom Declaration, collapsed after the failed Hanoi Trump-Kim summit in 2019.
- Asan Institute analyst Lee Dong-gyu said a peace treaty could reduce the need for US strategic assets in South Korea, potentially weakening Washington's regional military presence—a scenario analysts said Beijing would favor.
- Analysts warned that Trump's personalized diplomacy risks sidelining Seoul and Beijing, urging a four-party framework to manage the consequences of any direct US-North Korea deal.
Why it matters: A peace treaty that reduces the need for US strategic assets in South Korea directly serves Beijing's strategic interest in weakening Washington's regional military footprint—giving China a concrete reason to actively back Seoul's initiative rather than stay on the sidelines. Wang's call for Washington to abandon its "hostile policy" toward Pyongyang positions China as an indispensable broker while signaling that any deal excluding Beijing would be incomplete.
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