wfn.org | Episcopalians: Ecumenical agencies forge strategy on dealing with Korean crisis

[dmack@episcopalchurch.org]

April 16, 2003

2003-084

Episcopalians: Ecumenical agencies forge strategy on dealing 
with Korean crisis

by Carol Fouke-Mpoyo

(CWS/ENS) Top executives of the National Council of Churches 
(NCC) and Church World Service (CWS) convened an urgent meeting 
April 11 with representatives of member churches to outline a 
common advocacy strategy on U.S.-Korea policy.

They began to lay plans for a consultation in Washington, D.C., 
with North and South Korean church leaders, proposed for June 
2003, and for a U.S. ecumenical delegation visit to North and 
South Korea later this year--and they resolved to continue 
humanitarian assistance to the millions of North Koreans whose 
survival depends on external food aid.

"Our partners in Korea have urged us to work with them to find 
ways to lower tensions and to stave off the potential of a 
greater humanitarian crisis," said the Rev. John L. McCullough, 
executive director of CWS. "We believe that there is an 
imperative for a diplomatic resolution to these issues," he 
said, expressing CWS opposition to Washington's apparent new 
pre-emptive strike policy.

Dr. Bob Edgar, general secretary of the NCC, encouraged 
consultation participants to "also be thinking about how our 
response to the pending crisis on the Korean Peninsula relates 
to an overall U.S. foreign policy.  My fear is that we're going 
to find ourselves in a very violent century if we don't find a 
way to live as brothers and sisters with one another."

Participants agreed on the need to address the United States' 
confrontational policy toward North Korea, which it has included 
in the "axis of evil," and a refusal to engage in direct talks 
with North Korea.  The current political impasse must be 
resolved by peaceful means and not military means--and the 
United States should not use food as a weapon, they agreed.

Political stalemate

The growing tensions between the U.S. and North Korea (DPRK) 
have severely disrupted the political climate conducive to 
continued improvement in inter-Korean talks and the flow of 
urgently needed humanitarian food aid, McCullough said.  
"Humanitarian workers in the field say that halting humanitarian 
aid to North Korea will not break this political stalemate; 
rather, it will leave millions of people in a situation where 
they could easily slip back into a state of crisis."

According to the World Food Program, North Korea will need about 
two million metric tons of grain--a subsistence ration of about 
half a pound of grain per adult per day--from external sources, 
purchased or donated, in 2003. In February, U.S. Secretary of 
State Colin Powell announced an initial U.S. contribution of 
40,000 tons of commodities, adding that a further 60,000 tons 
would be made available if improvements in the World Food 
Program's ability to access the needy and monitor distributions 
are allowed.

"The situation this year is certainly grave given that the 
international community will be able to bring in at most 250,000 
metric tons, leaving the country short by 1.75 million metric 
tons," said Victor W.C. Hsu, senior advisor to the CWS executive 
director. North Korea does not have the foreign currency to buy 
and import the deficit amount, he said.

Massive needs

CWS, the global humanitarian agency of the NCC's 36 member 
denominations, has provided $4,250,029 in food aid to North 
Korea since the outbreak of the food crisis in 1996, and has 
played a leadership role in InterAction in encouraging 
humanitarian assistance to the famine-stricken nation.

In March 2003, CWS sent 660 metric tons (1.5 million pounds) of 
fortified wheat flour to North Korea in response to a direct 
appeal from the World Food Program.  Hsu spent April 1-5 in 
North Korea monitoring delivery of the flour.  He visited seven 
of the 20 beneficiary institutions, which serve two especially 
vulnerable groups: children under age seven and pregnant and 
nursing mothers.

"The Koreans kept asking me, When is the next shipment?'" Hsu 
said. "They are in need of all sorts of aid, whether it's 
medicine or food. The need is massive."

Regular visits by U.S. denominational and ecumenical leaders to 
the DPRK since 1985--and return visits by church leaders from 
both North and South Korea-- undergird the ecumenical commitment 
to advocacy for peace and justice on the Korean peninsula and a 
pioneering role in opening ecumenical and political 
relationships with North Korea.

The consultation in Washington, D.C., among church leaders from 
the United States, North and South Korea, proposed for June 
16-20, would be the first since 1997 and would include advocacy 
with U.S. policy makers.  The primary Korean partners would be 
the National Council of Churches of Korea (South Korea), the 
Korean Christians Federation (North Korea) and the Korean Church 
Women United.

The proposed CWS/NCC ecumenical delegation visit to North and 
South Korea later in 2003 would continue the dialogue and common 
advocacy and would include delivery of humanitarian assistance 
to North Korea.

Waging reconciliation

"Diplomacy on this level makes an enormous difference," said the 
Rev. Jacqueline Schmitt, chaplain at the Episcopal campus 
ministry at Northwestern University in Illinois, who represented 
the church at the meeting. She said that the NCC patiently has 
maintained its contacts with the Christians in North Korea over 
30 years and now "it offers great hope for a diplomacy that 
works--and one that could even defuse the conflict."

Schmitt said that she was deeply impressed by the commitment and 
experience represented in the meeting, adding that she shares 
the broader ecumenical hope that churches could "develop a 
foreign policy alternative, one that goes beyond some of the 
political rhetoric. And it seems to fit in where we seem to be 
as a church, waging international reconciliation as our 
presiding bishop has urged. There is a real urgency in our 
efforts to become an effective voice to counter a war 
mentality." She said that it was apparent that the Koreans are 
very eager for dialogue and "our churches could have an enormous 
impact as we continue to build those relationships."

The 17 participants in the April 11 planning meeting included 
representatives of several denominations active on Korea issues, 
including the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), United Methodist 
Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Episcopal 
Church, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), American Baptist 
Churches in the U.S.A., and Church of the Brethren.

------

--Carol Fouke-Mpoyo is director of news and information for the 
NCC. This article is based on reporting by Madalyn Metzger of 
CWS and James Solheim of ENS.