Diplomarbeit
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by OTHES Diplomarbeit Titel der Diplomarbeit Troubled Waters – Exploring the Northern Limit Line – An analysis of the conflict’s past reasons, present state and future solutions. Verfasser Benedikt Hofmann angestrebter akademischer Grad Magister der Philosophie (Mag. Phil.) Wien, 2012 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt: A300 Diplomstudium lt. Studienblatt: Politikwissenschaft Betreuer: AO. Univ.-Prof. Dr. Otmar Höll To my beloved wife Yayun, without whose support and understanding this would not have been possible Table of Contents 1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 1 1.1 The particularities of the NLL among other issues ................................................. 2 1.2 A few words of explanation ....................................................................................... 4 2. Historical Origins of the NLL ..................................................................... 5 2.1 The first division - the 1945 partition along the 38th parallel ................................ 9 2.2 A Country Divided ................................................................................................... 12 2.3 An imminent war ...................................................................................................... 15 2.4 The Korean War ....................................................................................................... 15 3. A theoretical approach .............................................................................. 24 3.1 Setting the Wider Stage – The East Asian Security Framework ......................... 25 3.2 A Neo-realist Approach ........................................................................................... 26 3.3 On the Necessity of Conflict – A Liberal Institutionalist Approach .................... 31 3.4 The Security Dilemma as an Aspect of the Prisoner’s Dilemma ......................... 34 3.5 The Korean Peninsula as a Part of Wider North East Asian Security ................ 38 3.6 A Theoretical Approach to Inter-Korean Relations ............................................. 41 4. The Korean Peninsula today .................................................................... 47 4.1 Partition along the MDL .......................................................................................... 48 4.2 The role of conventional forces along the MDL .................................................... 52 4.3 Conflicting Ideas – Unification Policies .................................................................. 55 4.4 Stabilizing factors – the economy ............................................................................ 63 4.5 The wider setting – international actors’ approach to Korea .............................. 68 5. The NLL within the wider scope of inter-Korean relations .................. 73 5.1 The MDL of the sea – naval forces on the NLL ..................................................... 73 5.2 Economic significance of the NLL .......................................................................... 75 5.3 International Views .................................................................................................. 78 6. Legal frameworks for the NLL dispute and its solution ........................ 80 6.1 The NLL and the Armistice Agreement ................................................................. 81 6.2 The implications of the UNCLOS for the NLL ..................................................... 84 6.3 Considering adjudication in accordance with international law ......................... 88 7. Position and justifications of the parties to the NLL ............................. 92 8. Proposals for a peaceful solution .............................................................. 94 8 Conclusion ................................................................................................... 96 Annex I: Maps ................................................................................................ 99 Annex II: Bibliography ............................................................................... 101 Abstracts ....................................................................................................... 115 English ........................................................................................................................... 115 German .......................................................................................................................... 116 1. Introduction 26 March 2010, 21:22 – the South Korean Pohang-class corvette Cheonan patrolled along its usual route near Baengnyeongdo, in the coastal waters to the west of the Korean Peninsula. A fair evening, the calm sea was betrayed only by the cruising warships, bearing witness of the explosive situation that had been developing in this area for almost 60 years. Suddenly, the sound of an explosion ripped through the dusk. In a blast that sailors aboard the Cheonan would later describe as a feeling of being lifted in the air, the 88 metre ship was blown in half. Within an hour1, the Cheonan sank to the ground 24 metres beneath the surface, killing 46 members of its crew.2 In times of overall high tensions between the two nations claiming the peninsula as their own, the sinking of a warship near a disputed border could only mean a further deterioration of relations. The situation threatened to escalate, fuelling fears of a full-scale war between the two Koreas, a war that, given the recent nuclear endeavours undertaken by the North, could very likely have consequences for the whole planet. A year after the sinking of the Cheonan, the situation on the peninsula remains tense. The world has been spared an all out war, but recurring acts of aggression along the inter- Korean maritime border are a constant reminder of the tinderbox that the Northern Limit Line (NLL), as the delimitation between North and South Korean in the Western Sea came to be called, presents to the world. The sinking was neither the first, nor the last incident surrounding this maritime delimitation. Ever since 1973, when the North first began questioning the validity of the NLL as a true maritime boundary, ships from both sides, both military and civilian, clashed in the Western Sea in an effort to prove their respective country’s claims over the territory in question. However, the Cheonan incident stands exemplary of the mixture of uncertainty, violence and propaganda that have shrouded the NLL ever since its inception in 1953, after the end of the Korean War. While the majority of the international community applauded the findings of an Independent Commission requested by South Korea on the incident, 1 Yonhap News Agency(2010): “S. Korean Navy ship sinking in the Yellow Sea”, Yonhap News Agency, on http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2010/03/26/18/0301000000AEN20100326008600320F.HTML, 04.12.2011 2 International Crisis Group (2010): “North Korea: The Risks of War in the Yellow Sea” (=Crisis Group Asia Report No. 198) p22 - 1 - putting the blame solely on Pyongyang, the North continues to dispute its complicity, backed by a second group of experts led by the Russian Federation.3 And reasons for doubt remain.4 As such, the incident is emblematic of inter-Korean relations as a whole. After decades of warming and cooling of relationships, a number of joint initiatives and declarations, border skirmishes and nuclear weapons tests, the two Koreas, states sharing a common history and culture, have yet to find measures that would support the climate of trust and confidence needed for a resolution of the conflict. Technically still at war since the signing of the Armistice Agreement in 1953, the two sides have over the years engaged in numerous confrontations that brought the peninsula to the brink of a full scale war. Both sides engage in extensive propaganda exercises, ranging from a self-righteous interpretation of history to large military manoeuvres involving international partners. Similar to such propaganda, the NLL is but one of a number of issues igniting open hostilities between the two sides. However, the NLL stands out among these issues as having, uncommonly often, caused particularly severe situations in recent years. 1.1 The particularities of the NLL among other issues As mentioned, a number of issues, historic or present, have caused the two Koreas to exchange hostilities. Nevertheless, the NLL has proven to be a particularly long-standing issue, repeatedly leading the two sides to an exchange of deadly force.5 The main reasons for this lie in its nature as a geographical issue. While other instances such as allegations over historic wrongs, propagandistic advances or accusations of warmongering can be disregarded by one side or the other and eventually dissolve in a change to more friendly language, the issue of the NLL, as a geographic dispute, targets a major cornerstone of each state’s legitimacy – their territorial sovereignty. While one side stepping back from a propagandistic exchange of words would usually eventually prove beneficiary for both parties by ending in a more positive climate enabling substantive discussions, giving way in a territorial dispute holds much further and – particularly discouraging – irrevocable 3 Snyder, Scott/Byun, See-Won (2011): “Cheonan and Yeonpyeong: The Northeast Asian Response to North Korea’s Provocations”, in RUSI Journal