The Korean peninsula remains a cold War preserve and a long-standing potential hotbed of armed conflict, which is becoming increasingly nuclear-tinged after Pyongyang's acquisition of nuclear missiles.

The six-Party talks on the Korean nuclear issue were interrupted by Pyongyang in April 2009 in response to the UN Security Council's condemnation of the launch of a North Korean rocket with a space satellite. And another escalation of the situation on the peninsula in 2010, associated with the sinking of the South Korean frigate Cheonan, accompanied by the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island and large-scale US-South Korean maneuvers in the Yellow Sea, complicated the resumption of negotiations on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

According to the Deauville Declaration of May 27, 2011, the G8 countries pledged to " put up a barrier to the acute nonproliferation challenges that threaten global stability, especially in Iran and the DPRK," and condemned " the provocative behavior of the DPRK in relation to the Armistice Agreement and a number of inter-Korean agreements, its continued development of nuclear and missile programs." as well as programs for uranium enrichment and the construction of a light water reactor in violation of UN Security Council resolutions 1718 and 1874. " ¹

In the summer of 2011, there were positive developments in the resumption of the Six-Party talks. In July, during the ASEAN Regional Security Forum, the first informal meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the DPRK and the Republic of Korea in the last three years took place, at which the ministers agreed to resume the negotiations of the "six". Then, First Deputy Foreign Minister Kim Kyo-gwan met with US Special Representative for North Korean Policy S. Bosworth in New York and with Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun in Beijing. However, so far Washington continues to adhere to the position that it is not interested in negotiations for the sake of negotiations.

Another artillery exchange of fire on August 10, 2011 in the area of the disputed "northern boundary line" between the two Koreas in the Yellow Sea near Yeonpyeong Island showed the precariousness of some reduction in tension between them. An international non-governmental "crisis group" concluded in late 2010 that this "border in the Yellow Sea has the greatest potential to lead to an outbreak of the second Korean War"².

On August 24, 2011, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev held talks with Chairman of the State Defense Committee of the DPRK Kim Jong Il in Ulan-Ude. The two leaders discussed a wide range of issues, including the Korean nuclear program, the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, and the resumption of six-party talks to resolve the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue.^3 According to the press secretary of the Russian President N. Timakova, during the meeting Kim Jong Il confirmed that his country is ready to return to the table of the six-party talks on the settlement of the nuclear problem of the Korean peninsula without preconditions, " during the talks, North Korea will be ready to resolve the issue of introducing a moratorium on testing and production of nuclear4.

While there is almost unanimous assessment of the continuing situation on the Korean peninsula as explosive, there are different opinions on the reasons for this situation and the prospects for the success of the six-Party talks if they resume.⁵

In this issue of the journal, the head of the Center for Korean Studies of the Institute of the Far East of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Candidate of Political Sciences A. Z. Zhebin, and Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor of MGIMO V. I. Denisov express their views.

¹ Website of the President of the Russian Federation. The Group of Eight Deauville Declaration: An unwavering commitment to freedom and democracy. 27.05.2011 - http://news.kremlin.ru/ref_notes/946

^{Harlan Chico.} 2 Two Koreas Appear to Exchange Fire along Disputed Sea Border // Washington Post, 11.08.2011.

³ Website of the President of the Russian Federation. Meeting with journalists after talks with Chairman of the State Defense Committee of the DPRK Kim Jong Il. 24.08.2011, Улан-Удэ -http://news.kremlin.ru/news/12421

⁴ ITAR-TASS, 24.08.2011.

⁵ For more information, see: Korean Peninsula: Dangerous games. Vorontsov A.V., Agaltsov P. The nuclear intrigue of the Korean Peninsula; Rusakov E. M. The ghosts return from the "cold" / / Asia and Africa Today, 2010, No. 10 (ed.).

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