Han Sung-joo

Han Sung-joo began as a scholar of politics. A Seoul National University graduate, he earned his doctorate at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1970 and taught at the City University of New York before a long association with Korea University. He also held visiting appointments at Columbia and Stanford. His published work addressed Korean politics, foreign policy, and changing Asian values. ¹

As foreign minister in 1993–1994, Han helped manage the first North Korean nuclear crisis. In a later oral history interview he recalled urging Chinese officials to tell Pyongyang that it could not rely on a Chinese veto of UN sanctions. He also described close consultation with American negotiator Robert Gallucci during the talks that produced the 1994 Agreed Framework. Although South Korea was not a signatory, Han sought language committing the North to dialogue between the Koreas and regarded that provision as essential to acceptance at home. ²

Han's subsequent international assignments included service as the UN secretary-general's special representative for Cyprus, membership of the 1999 inquiry into the UN's response to the Rwanda genocide, and chairmanship of the East Asia Vision Group. ¹

Returning to Washington as ambassador in 2003–2005, he again dealt with the North Korean nuclear dispute. In February 2004 he publicly argued that the Six-Party Talks had to address uranium enrichment, one of the central disputes after the earlier agreement broke down. He later returned to Korea University as acting president in 2006–2007, chaired the Asan Institute for Policy Studies, and published the diplomatic memoir On the Brink in 2018. ^{1, 3}