SEOUL, South Korea: South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Monday welcomed North Korea’s announcement that it is set to dismantle its only nuclear test site, calling it a start to the country’s nuclear disarmament.
North Korea said Saturday that it will dismantle its northeastern Punggye-ri test site between May 23 and 25 in the presence of local and international media. The dismantling would come before North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump meet for June 12 talks in Singapore expected to focus on Kim’s nuclear program.
Moon said Monday that the North’s move shows how sincere the country is about making the talks between Kim and Trump a success. “This would be a preliminary step toward complete denuclearization,” Moon said during a meeting with his aides, according to his office.
Trump, in a tweet Saturday, already thanked North Korea for its plan to dismantle the nuclear test site, calling it “a very smart and gracious gesture!”
After months of tensions over his nuclear and missile tests, Kim has been reaching out to Washington and Seoul since the beginning of the year. He sent a delegation to February’s Winter Olympics in South Korea, held a landmark summit with Moon in April and last week released three Americans detained in North Korea.
Kim is also willing to place his nuclear program up for negotiations in return for security assurances, according to Seoul. But some experts still doubt how committed Kim is to taking serious disarmament steps because his country was close to achieving its goal of possessing nuclear missiles targeting the mainland US after decades of struggle.
Moon’s office previously said Kim told Moon during their April 27 summit that he would allow not only outside journalists but also experts to watch the dismantling of the Punggy-ri test site. But the North’s announcement Saturday did not mention anything about inviting experts to Punggy-ri, spawning speculation that the North may want to hide some information about its past nuclear tests.
Some experts have downplayed the closure of the Punggy-ri site, where all six of the North’s known underground nuclear explosions happened, saying it is already too unstable for more testing. Kim has denied such views, saying the site has two additional underground tunnels that could be used for new tests.
South Korea praises Pyongyang’s plan to dismantle nuclear test site
South Korea praises Pyongyang’s plan to dismantle nuclear test site
Culture being strangled by Kosovo’s political crisis
- Cultural institutions have been among the hardest-hit sectors, as international funding dried up and local decisions were stalled by the parliamentary crisis
PRIZREN: Kosovo’s oldest cinema has been dark and silent for years as the famous theater slowly disintegrates under a leaky roof.
Signs warn passers-by in the historic city of Prizren that parts of the Lumbardhi’s crumbling facade could fall while it waits for its long-promised refurbishment.
“The city deserves to have the cinema renovated and preserved. Only junkies gathering there benefit from it now,” nextdoor neighbor butcher Arsim Futko, 62, told AFP.
For seven years, it waited for a European Union-funded revamp, only for the money to be suddenly withdrawn with little explanation.
Now it awaits similar repairs promised by the national government that has since been paralyzed by inconclusive elections in February.
And it is anyone’s guess whether the new government that will come out of Sunday’s snap election will keep the promise.
- ‘Collateral damage’ -
Cinema director Ares Shporta said the cinema has become “collateral damage” in a broader geopolitical game after the EU hit his country with sanctions in 2023.
The delayed repairs “affected our morale, it affected our lives, it affected the trust of the community in us,” Shporta said.
Brussels slapped Kosovo with sanctions over heightened tensions between the government and the ethnic Serb minority that live in parts of the country as Pristina pushed to exert more control over areas still tightly linked to Belgrade.
Cultural institutions have been among the hardest-hit sectors, as international funding dried up and local decisions were stalled by the parliamentary crisis.
According to an analysis by the Kosovo think tank, the GAP Institute for Advanced Studies, sanctions have resulted in around 613 million euros ($719 million) being suspended or paused, with the cultural sector taking a hit of 15-million-euro hit.
- ‘Ground zero’ -
With political stalemate threatening to drag on into another year, there are warnings that further funding from abroad could also be in jeopardy.
Since February’s election when outgoing premier Albin Kurti topped the polls but failed to win a majority, his caretaker government has been deadlocked with opposition lawmakers.
Months of delays, spent mostly without a parliament, meant little legislative work could be done.
Ahead of the snap election on Sunday, the government said that more than 200 million euros ($235 million) will be lost forever due to a failure to ratify international agreements.
Once the top beneficiary of the EU Growth Plan in the Balkans, Europe’s youngest country now trails most of its neighbors, the NGO Group for Legal and Political Studies’ executive director Njomza Arifi told AFP.
“While some of the countries in the region have already received the second tranches, Kosovo still remains at ground zero.”
Although there have been some enthusiastic signs of easing a half of EU sanctions by January, Kurti’s continued push against Serbian institutions and influence in the country’s north continues to draw criticism from both Washington and Brussels.
- ‘On the edge’ -
Across the river from the Lumbardhi, the funding cuts have also been felt at Dokufest, a documentary and short film festival that draws people to the region.
“The festival has had to make staff cuts. Unfortunately, there is a risk of further cuts if things don’t change,” Dokufest artistic director Veton Nurkollari said.
“Fortunately, we don’t depend on just one source because we could end up in a situation where, when the tap is turned off, everything is turned off.”
He said that many in the cultural sector were desperate for the upcoming government to get the sanctions lifted by ratification of the agreements that would allow EU funds to flow again.
“Kosovo is the only one left on the edge and without these funds.”
