President Park Geun-hye has recently taken the right and necessary steps by strengthening efforts to communicate with and seek support from political circles.

Following meetings earlier this week with senior members of the ruling Saenuri Party and parliamentary leaders, she is scheduled to hold talks over dinner Friday with leaders of the main opposition Democratic United Party at the presidential office of Cheong Wa Dae. These top-level encounters are vital at a time when bipartisan cooperation is needed more than ever to reinvigorate the economy and deal with mounting tensions with North Korea.

Park, who has come under increasing criticism for her uncommunicative leadership style, should have moved more quickly and aggressively to court support from political circles, which will be essential to back her key policy agenda with legislative measures. It is hoped that the long stalemate with the opposition over her personnel appointments and government reorganization plan, which dragged on her administration during its crucial opening days, will serve as a lesson throughout her five-year presidency that started in February.

The DUP was also right to be quick to accept Park’s proposal. Its interim leader, Moon Hee-sang, stroke a pertinent tone by expressing willingness to cooperate with Park’s administration on matters related to national security and people’s livelihoods.

To overcome the grave challenges facing the nation, the government and the main political parties should join hands to put their partisan interests on the shelf.

The pressing circumstances require Friday’s meeting to produce tangible results. Most of all, Park and opposition leaders should demonstrate a united stance on coping with escalating threats from Pyongyang. Its recent moves, including suspending the operation of an inter-Korean industrial complex in Gaeseong, appear partly aimed at fueling internal discord in South Korea. A firmly united posture in the South would be essential to discourage the North from making such attempts and thus to produce a breakthrough in the mounting tensions on the peninsula.

More concretely, Park and DUP leaders need to coordinate their positions on whether to send a special envoy to Pyongyang to open the door for dialogue. The president is against the idea, while the opposition party has called on her government to consider taking the initiative. The DUP is advised to withdraw its proposal, as dispatching an envoy at this moment is likely to send the wrong signal to Pyongyang, and do little to improve inter-Korean ties.