An international delegation of church leaders has hailed an 'almost miraculous new spring' for North Korea after a visit to Pyongyang following the historic summit meeting between the presidents of the North and South.
The six-person delegation from the World Council of Churches and the World Communion of Reformed Churches returned after a trip to the capital Pyongyang from May 3-7 at the invitation of North Korea's Korean Christian Federation.
While North Korea is regarded as a closed country with few international links, low-profile relations with the world church bodies have endured for more than 30 years and the world-wide ecumenical movement has continued to promote the cause of reunification.
The statement published after the delegation's visit praises moves to alleviate military tensions and achieve a peace treaty to end the formal state of war on the peninsula.
It says: 'We celebrate and affirm the joint declaration of commitment to realizing, through complete denuclearization, a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula – in the context of our efforts for a nuclear-free world through advocacy for universal ratification and implementation of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.'
The delegation met with Kim Yong Nam, president of North Korea's Presidium of the Supreme Peoples Assembly of the DPRK who, with South Korea's minister for reunification, 'affirmed and emphasized the importance of the role of church leaders and faith communities in past and future efforts for peace and reunification of the Korean people'.
The statement said: 'The delegation saw the Inter-Korean Summit and its outcomes as an almost miraculous new spring for peace in the region, after months and years of dangerously escalating tensions.'
'We visited Pyongyang in a beautiful new spring season, not only in the natural world but also in the relations between the people and governments of the Korean peninsula,' said WCC general secretary Rev Dr Olav Fykse Tveit.
'We know that spring is also a season in which to work, to ensure that we reap a good harvest of what has been sown.'
The delegation urges 'all churches, all Christians called by our Lord Jesus Christ to be peacemakers, and all people of good will around the world to join in supporting the Korean-led initiatives for peace expressed in the Panmunjom Declaration [signed by the leaders of the North and South at their summit], as a foundation and framework for achieving a sustainable peace for the Korean people, for the region, and for the world'.
