Korean Peninsula Diplomacy: Locals' expectations on Trump-Kim summit

World
Europe

03:16

Top diplomats from the United States, South Korea and Japan have pledged to work closely to ensure Pyongyang denuclearizes. The meeting comes after the landmark meeting in Singapore between US President Donald Trump and DPRK leader Kim Jong-un. CGTN's Jack Barton went to the South Korean side of the Demilitarized Zone to find out how the people who live there view the summit.

The deal struck at the summit between Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump may have been short on detail, but on Thursday in Seoul the top diplomats of the U.S. Japan and South Korea stood united, at least in public, in the praise of the outcome.

MIKE POMPEO US SECRETARY OF STATE "Kim Jong Un's public commitment to completely denuclearise is an important step towards to bring lasting peace and stability to Northeast Asia and indeed to the entire world."

Also on Thursday military officials from both sides of the DMZ also met for the first time in 10 years to discuss easing tensions and strengthening formal ties. So are South Koreans reassured? Particularly those living near the barbed wire of the Demilitarized Zone, where people still hang ribbons expressing their wish for reunification.

SHIN GIJA "We do not expect too much to change after one or two meetings between the two Koreas. But as the year goes by it is our only hope that inter-Korean exchanges will continue and the days when guns and knives were aimed at each other will pass."

LEE JOON-KOO "There is a good indication that there are expectations of a good direction, but there have been many lies in the past. Well, we older, more conservative people. We have hope but not high expectations."

So cautious optimism, enough to spark a land buying frenzy in this area that has become so over-heated the government is now threatened to intervene. That's not the only change.

JACK BARTON IMJINGAK PEACE PARK, ON EDGE OF DMZ "The potential for a military de-escalation here at the demilitarized zone as well as the spotlight all the diplomacy has shone on the world's most fortified frontier has led to an influx of something that is more welcome and that is an influx of tourists."

Particularly tourists from South Korea according to Jung Sung-chun who runs a small souvenir shop just beyond the wire. Mr Jung was born in what is now the demilitarized zone and says his confidence will rise only when he sees real change and that means more than denuclearization talks and inter-Korean exchanges.

JUNG SUNG-CHUN SOUVENIR SHOP OWNER "It's not unification if you just eliminate the barbed wire. If we can go back and forth that is unification, then it will become a natural re-unification later on."

The deal reached in Singapore has received a lot of criticism for being too vague. But if all does go well, it just might be possible that in a few years the only troops here will be ones like these South Korean marines who have come as tourists to see what will hopefully by then be just a relic of the past. Jack Barton for CGTN at the Imjingak Peace Park.