hankyoreh

South Korean gold medalist Kim Yu-na

The entire world has resolved to refrain from all kinds of hostile activities for the duration of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics. The Olympic Truce resolution, titled “Building a peaceful and better world through sport and the Olympic ideal,” was unanimously adopted by the UN during the 72nd session of the General Assembly in New York on the morning of Nov. 13. The truce is an Olympic tradition that dates back to the ancient Olympic Games.

Since 1993, the UN has passed this kind of resolution before each session of the summer and winter Olympics, but the resolution is especially significant this time around. The resolution, the draft of which was largely composed by the South Korean government, voices the “expectation that Pyeongchang 2018 will be a meaningful opportunity to foster an atmosphere of peace, development, tolerance and understanding on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia.”

This resolution also sends a message to North Korea. “I really hope that the North Korean athletes who I was unable to meet when I was an athlete will take part in the games,” said Kim Yuna, honorary ambassador for the Pyeongchang Olympics, who took the stage at the UN General Assembly as a guest speaker to speak in support of the resolution. Even during the ancient Olympic Games, for a city to send its athletes to compete at Olympia meant that they intended to keep the ekecheria – the Olympic Truce. Currently, the North Korean figure skating duo of Ryom Tae-ok and Kim Ju-sik have qualified for the Olympics. Since their competing in the Olympics is both an obvious right and a duty, it would be even stranger for them not to compete.

As a festival of peace, the Olympics have often provided a powerful opportunity for reconciliation and for communicating to the world that the Korean people are one. During the opening ceremony of the Sydney Olympics in 2000, North and South Korean athletes appeared for the first time under the name “Korea,” carrying the Korean Unification Flag while “Arirang” played in the background. The sight reminded people of the true meaning of the Olympics.

North and South Korea also appeared simultaneously during the opening ceremonies of the Athens Summer Olympics in 2004 and the Turin Winter Olympics in 2006. But this practice ended prior to the Beijing Olympics in 2008, and has not occurred since. A visit to Pyeongchang by North Korean athletes will be another step toward achieving inter-Korean reconciliation through the Olympics. Next year’s Pyeongchang Winter Olympics is especially significant since it is the starting point of three consecutive Olympic Games in northeast Asia, the next two being the Tokyo Summer Olympics in 2020 and the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022.

an honorary ambassador for the Pyeongchang Olympics

We hope that North Korean athletes attending the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics will usher in a spring of peace and reconciliation to the Korean Peninsula, where military tensions are high. Tensions soared because of North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile tests, but the crisis on the Korean Peninsula has recently seemed to be entering a lull. This requires a proactive change of attitude toward treating the Pyeongchang Olympics as a starting point for resolving the crisis on the Korean Peninsula. Spring after spring, the Korean Peninsula sees military tensions rise because of the South Korea-US joint military drills, which are held between February to April of each year, and because of North Korea’s response to those drills.

The resolution states that the Olympic Truce will last from Feb. 2 to Mar. 25. This partly overlaps with the period when the South Korea-US joint military drills are held. There is no definitive interpretation of whether military exercises are included in the Olympic Truce. At the least, however, delaying the military exercises would be in the spirit of the truce. We hope that this will be accompanied by an attempt to find a solution linked to China’s proposal of “simultaneous suspension” of North Korea’s nuclear weapon and missile provocations and the South Korea-US joint military exercises or an opportunity to resume inter-Korean dialogue. That’s how to make the Pyeongchang Olympics blossom as a true forum for peace.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]