Park Geun-hye becomes South Korea's first female president, Warns North Korea
Park Geun-hye made history Monday by becoming South Korea's first female president, pledging to secure South Korea against the threat of an increasingly hostile North Korea at the same time as mending bridges with Pyongyang.
"North Korea's recent
nuclear test is a challenge to the survival and future of the Korean
people, and there should be no mistake that the biggest victim will be
none other than North Korea itself," she said. "I urge North Korea to
abandon its nuclear ambitions without delay and embark on the path to
peace and shared development."
Reiterating her policy of
'trustpolitik' - a policy based on deterrence combined with cautious
approaches to North Korea - she said she intended to "lay the groundwork
for an era of harmonious unification where all Koreans can lead more
prosperous and freer lives and where their dreams can come true."
"I will move forward step-by-step on the basis of credible deterrence to build trust between the South and
the North."
She said South Koreans
stood at a new juncture, confronting the difficulties of the global
financial crisis as well as the threat from the North.
"I will usher in a new
era of hope whereby the happiness of each citizen becomes the bedrock of
our nation's strength which in turn is shared by and benefits all
Koreans," she said.
When she was elected last
December, Park broke barriers in the patriarchal East Asian nation,
though she is deeply connected to its past. Her father, Park Chung-hee,
was one of the founders of modern Korea who took power after a coup
d'etat and ruled heavy-handedly for 18 years before being shot dead by
his intelligence chief in 1979.
His memory still divides
South Korea -- some regard him as the cornerstone of South Korea's
present prosperity, others see him as a dictator who ignored human
rights and crushed dissent.
Although she has
apologized for human rights violations during his rule, Park has been
criticized for not doing enough to distance herself from his legacy.
Still, any concerns about her family's past weren't enough to prevent 52% of voters from elevating her to the presidency.
Park, 61, and her
opponent, the Democratic United Party's Moon Jae-in, offered similarly
moderate plans during the campaign, addressing income inequality,
reining in the power of family-owned conglomerates and improving
relations with North Korea.
On North Korea, Park
distinguished herself from former President Lee Myung-bak, who demanded
an end to Pyongyang's nuclear arms program as a condition of economic
aid, by offering a softer, carrot-and-stick approach.
I will move forward step-by-step on the basis of credible deterrence to build trust between the South and the North
Park Geun-hye
Park Geun-hye
She visited the North
Korean capital in 2002 and met with its late leader Kim Jong Il. Since
then, his son Kim Jong Un has taken over in Pyongyang, continuing a
policy of defiant work on the country's budding nuclear program,
including a test earlier this month that drew widespread international
condemnation.
"Precisely because trust
is at a low point these days, South Korea has a chance to rebuild it,"
Park told Foreign Affairs magazine before she won the election. "In
order to transform the Korean Peninsula from a zone of conflict into a
zone of trust, South Korea has to adopt a policy of 'trustpolitik,'
establishing mutually binding expectations based on global norms."
Domestically, Park
campaigned as a fiscal conservative, advocating tax cuts for business to
boost investment and jobs and vowing to restructure welfare programs.
At the same time, she promised soon after winning election "to take care
of our people one by one."
In a speech at the
headquarters of her Saenuri political party Thursday morning, she
invoked a phrase coined by her father, who also served as president in
an era when he was encouraging people to pull South Korea out of
poverty.
"I would like to
re-create the miracle of 'let's live well' so people can worry less
about their livelihood and young people can happily go to work," Park
said.