◈ The 4th Declaration of the State of Affairs

by the Former Senior Officials of the Korean Foreign Service◈

Following the end of the Second World War, the entire world achieved remarkable and unprecedented economic growth under a global system guided by the United States. The world economy grew by an annual average of approximately 4% over the past sixty years, and free trade flourished across the planet.

Such exceptional growth of the global economy must fundamentally be credited to the expansion of liberal democracy and the market economy, which created fertile grounds for economic development.

President Syngman Rhee had the insight to understand this new wave earlier and founded the Republic of Korea upon a strong belief in a free democratic system.

Following the footsteps of Korea's founding leader, President Park Chung-hee, armed with the powerful conviction that "we can do it too", established the beginning of what would become the most stunning economic development in the history of the country through close cooperation with the United States and Japan. It was during this time that the seeds of Korea's growth into one of the world's great economies and a member of today's advanced world's civilization were planted.

While bucking these irresistible tides in the flow of world history, worshiping the ideology of communism, North Korea, the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union colluded to turn the Korean peninsula into a totalitarian communist state and embed the Kim dynasty into power and launched a surprise attack into South Korea. The invasion and the struggles of the war turned the nation into rubble, but Korea rose again to rebuild itself.

With massive economic, financial and technological assistance from our staunch allies including the United States and Japan, Korea was not only able to quickly rebuild its economy but concentrate on developing key sectors such as heavy industry, petrochemicals, construction, shipbuilding, automobiles, electronics industry including semiconductor to become one of the world's leading industrial and trade powerhouses.

Strenuously ignoring this proud history of its foundation and development of the Republic of Korea, President Moon Jae-in continues to threaten the Korea-U.S. alliance, which has served as the cornerstone of our nation's development.

The close ties between our two nations is under assault from several fronts, including the transfer of wartime operational control between Korea and the U.S., a lukewarm response to the deployment of THAAD on the peninsula, refusal to take part in the U.S.-led missile defense system, and vacillation over participating in Korea-U.S.-Japan partnership.

In its foreign policy towards Japan, the Moon administration has adopted the anachronistic stance of treating Japan as if it was still yesterday's imperialist power instead of one of today's important defenders of free democracy and a member of the G7 countries, continuously provoking Japan over emotionally-charged disputes regarding the misfortunes in the history of the two countries and thereby not only harming our national interests but earning the reproach of the international community.

Overly conscious of China, the Moon administration has adopted a recalcitrant attitude towards the Korea-U.S. defense partnership, making promises contrary to the Korea-U.S.-Japan alliance and taking an almost servile attitudes towards China with little regard to our national sovereignty.

On the other hand, the administration is relentlessly extending unrealistic reconciliatory gestures towards North Korea, the very party that has threatened our national foundation and subsequent stable and peaceful economic development.

If the Moon administration truly wishes to seek sincere dialogue and reconciliation, such efforts must be preceded by the return of Korean prisoners of war taken to North Korea during the Korean War and held against their will and efforts to end the severe violation of human rights under which the people of North Korea suffer.

Regarding the North Korean nuclear issue, the Moon administration continues to undermine our national defense including our Korea-U.S. readiness posture while North Korea plainly has no wish to give up its nuclear armaments under the principle of FFVD.

The Panmunjom Declaration, the Pyongyang Joint Declaration and the inter-Korean military agreement represent the unilateral disarmament of the Republic of Korea and will serve as the catalyst for an eventual system, North-South federation, the ultimate goal of the present Juche-adherent administration.

The Moon administration has recently brought suspicion upon itself of violating U.N. sanctions on North Korea by engaging in actions that appear to be facilitating the smuggling of coal and refined petroleum. Such actions may invite sanction against our financial institutions by the international community and undermine our national credit rating, leading to Korea's ostracism or even expulsion from the global trade market.

With the Korean economy on the verge of recession, President Moon continues to make grave misinterpretations about the health of our economy. Coupled with policies that are completely contrary to the current status of the real economy including efforts to eliminate nuclear power, the untimely initiation of a 52-hour workweek, the rapid increase of the minimum wage and rising corporate and income taxes, the government's management of the economy is exacerbating unemployment and hampering corporate activities.

The administration's direct and indirect interference of the management of Korea's large corporations and a blind eye to management meddling by labor unions has cut the productivity of our export industry, Korea's economic core, and turned our current account balance into the red. Unrestrained government spending into areas with almost no job-creation benefit has also plunged our fiscal balance into debt, and Korea's economic prospects continue to turn even more grim as these environments keep driving our key companies to flee overseas for survival.

These failures in Korea's national economic policy has not escaped the attention of global credit rating agencies, and Korea's economic development forecast is being revised down to 2%.

We must clearly acknowledge that unless the Moon administration's anti-Korean and anti-consitutional actions are curtailed, Korea will only be further driven towards eventual destruction.

Recently, the Christian Council of Korea issued a statement demanding the resignation of President Moon by December of this year.

We feel that the statement by the Council is timely and appropriate considering the current crisis being faced by our nation, and we wish to express our support for statement.

June 22nd, 2019

This declaration is endorsed by 65 former senior officials of the Korean Foreign Service.