러시아의 對한반도 정책 소고와 전망 연구

Abstract

This article is about an examination of Russian government’s past policies toward the Korean Peninsula and of a review on the current Putin administration's policy toward the same. Gorbachev and Yeltsin, past supreme leaders of Russia consistently favored South Korea in the country’s policy toward the Korean Peninsula. In 2000, as the first Putin administration took over, followed by the second and third ones, the framework of their Korean Peninsula policy was newly based on maintaining equal distance (the New Equidistant Diplomacy) between the South and North Koreas. As the Putin government of the present day seized it power, Russia’s Korean Peninsula policy is entering a new strategic phase. The Russian government is making an approach, of which goal is to reinforce its once-tarnished status and influence while also pursuing economic benefits through the new equidistant diplomacy, visiting diplomacy and the likes. The reason for such change is no less relevant to the military stabilization of Northeast Asia, and to its desperate economic development in the Siberia and Far East Region which are the bases for Russia’s largest emphasis in its business. The project of connecting the Trans-Korean Railway (TKR) and the Trans-Siberian Railway (TSR), which is likely to be realized soon, as well as the oil pipeline construction from Sakhalin through North Korea to South Korea have been ongoing since long ago with the suggestions of proactive plans. The Korean government should also pay close attention to bilateral diplomacy so that it can play a constructive role with Russia through the implementation of the denuclearization and armistice agreements of the Korean Peninsula through the high-level channels including the summit talks and working-level conferences between the South, North and the United States.