Then South Korean President Kim Dae-jung (R, Front) and then top leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Kim Jong Il (L, Front) review the guard of honor of DPRK in Pyongyang, capital of DPRK, on June 13, 2000. (Xinhua/Li Zhenyu)
BUD OF LASTING PEACE
The face-to-face summit marks a potential turning point in the long time hostility between the two Koreas in history, and sent the hope of lasting peace on the peninsula.
The leaders confirmed the common goal of making the Korean Peninsula nuclear-free via complete denuclearization in the Panmunjom Declaration for Peace, Prosperity and Unification of the Korean Peninsula.
"The South and the North affirmed their mutual goal of realizing a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula through complete denuclearization," the released statement said.
The leaders also agreed to formally end the Korean War, which will be declared later this year, 65 years after hostilities ceased.
The two Koreas technically remain at war as the 1950-1953 war ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.
To formally end the Korean War, the two Koreas agreed to push for three-way or four-way talks involving the United States and China to replace the Korean armistice with a peace treaty.
But achieving the goal of denuclearization could be a bumpy journey ahead given the difference between Pyongyang and Washington in defining denuclearization.
The DPRK wants the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, while the United States wants the denuclearization of the DPRK.
Denuclearization "largely depends on North Korea (the DPRK) and American relations rather than inter-Korean relations," Leonid Petrov, a Korean Peninsula expert at the Australian National University, told Xinhua before the summit.
According to Park Jie-won, a lawmaker from South Korea's Party for Democracy and Peace, the most important thing in the denuclearization process is building trust between the DPRK and the United States.
To discuss additional measures, the two Koreas will hold general-grade military talks before the end of May.
Further, the leaders agreed to a range of measures aimed at promoting peace and reconciliation between the divided Koreas.
