AFP, Seoul :
The widow of late South Korean president Kim Dae-Jung returned home today from a rare trip to North Korea but her hoped-for meeting with leader Kim Jong-Un failed to come off.
Lee Hee-Ho’s four-day visit was ostensibly humanitarian but there had been much speculation about a possible meeting with Kim, who personally invited her.
However, her aides said she had had no chance of seeing the young leader during the trip.
Lee’s husband is best remembered for his “sunshine” policy of engagement with the isolated but nuclear-armed North that led to a historic summit between him and Kim Jong-Un’s late father Kim Jong-Il in 2000.
Lee said she visited the North as a private civilian and had not been assigned any official duty.
“However, I made the trip with a view to dedicating to the spirit of the June 15 declaration”, she said in a statement on returning to Seoul, referring to an inter-Korean agreement for peace and reconciliation signed at the end of the landmark summit.
The widow of late South Korean president Kim Dae-Jung returned home today from a rare trip to North Korea but her hoped-for meeting with leader Kim Jong-Un failed to come off.
Lee Hee-Ho’s four-day visit was ostensibly humanitarian but there had been much speculation about a possible meeting with Kim, who personally invited her.
However, her aides said she had had no chance of seeing the young leader during the trip.
Lee’s husband is best remembered for his “sunshine” policy of engagement with the isolated but nuclear-armed North that led to a historic summit between him and Kim Jong-Un’s late father Kim Jong-Il in 2000.
Lee said she visited the North as a private civilian and had not been assigned any official duty.
“However, I made the trip with a view to dedicating to the spirit of the June 15 declaration”, she said in a statement on returning to Seoul, referring to an inter-Korean agreement for peace and reconciliation signed at the end of the landmark summit.
