South Korea‘s point man on inter-Korean affairs will visit the US next month to explain the current administration’s policy on North Korea and ease widespread skepticism over North Korea’s commitment to dismantle its nuclear weapons program.

Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon plans to meet senior US officials and scholars during his visit to Washington set for Nov. 13-17, Yonhap News Agency reported Tuesday, citing an unnamed ministry official. 

The official said that “the mid-November visit is being pushed.” The time frame of the visit may change, depending on the second North Korea-US summit and inter-Korean events, he added.

“The focus will be on promoting understanding of the North Korea issue in the US political and private sectors,” the official said.

The minister will also attend the annual Korea Global Forum held in the US capital on Nov. 15 and meet Korean residents, he said. The conference, launched in 2010, is hosted by the ministry and aims to discuss issues surrounding the Korean Peninsula with US officials and experts.

Cho’s US visit come on the heels of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Sunday in Pyongyang. Pompeo said Monday he and Kim had made “significant progress” toward denuclearization and agreed to hold a second summit as soon as possible, though a specific date or venue has yet to be set.

Pompeo added that Kim invited US inspectors to the Punggye-ri nuclear test site in its northeastern region, which Pyongyang dismantled in May to prove its commitment to denuclearization.

Despite signs pointing to a resumption of stalled US-North Korea talks, US officials and have continued to cast doubts on North Korea’s willingness to denuclearize given its history of backtracking on its pledges to abandon its nuclear program. 

in 2007, as part of an effort to achieve North Korea’s denuclearization, the US and Japan committed to engage in talks with Pyongyang to normalize relations, while all members of the six-party talks would work to provide 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil within a 60-day period.

To prove its commitment to denuclearize, the North detonated a cooling tower at its Yongbyon nuclear complex in June 2008. But the six-party talks discontinued in 2009 over the involved parties’ failure to reach consensus on the North’s nuclear program. North Korea then proceeded to carry out its second nuclear test in the same year.

There are also concerns that declaring an end to the Korean War would result in removal of US troops stationed on the Korean Peninsula, despite President Moon Jae-in’s repeated assurances this would not be the case.

North Korea has called on the US to actively engage in talks on declaring an end to the Korean War, which was halted in 1953 with an armistice, not a peace treaty. The US has said that it would not make such a concession unless the North takes substantive steps towards denuclearization.

Amid a mood of inter-Korean detente, Cho has been involved in a flurry of diplomacy between the South and North. He accompanied Moon on his trip last month to Pyongyang for a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. Cho also led the South’s delegation to the North last week for a joint celebration of the anniversary of the second inter-Korean summit in 2007.

During his trip to Washington, Cho is also likely to make efforts to further promote a virtuous cycle of inter-Korean ties and US-North Korea talks. Inter-Korean projects that include connecting and modernizing cross-border railways have been facing obstacles over lack of progress in denuclearization talks between Washington and Pyongyang.

By Jung Min-kyung (mkjung@heraldcorp.com)