Today’s summit meeting between the Heads of State of South and North Korea in Panmunjom is an important and courageous step in the right direction. We welcome this development, which will hopefully lead to concrete outcomes in connection with international concerns about North Korea’s efforts to build up a nuclear arsenal. Yet we in Germany, a former divided country, also hope that the summit will lead to tangible improvements in the lives of the people in North and South Korea.

The fact that today the two states on the Korean peninsula have taken this step towards one another, and have documented their goals in a joint summit declaration, constitutes a significant milestone. The coming weeks and months now need to reveal whether the countries can embark on a viable, sustainable process which will ultimately culminate in a peaceful solution for the issues affecting the Korean peninsula. In this context, the international community expects North Korea above all to enter into talks on its illegal nuclear and missile programmes. The goal of these talks must be clear: comprehensive, verifiable and irreversible denuclearisation. Germany remains willing to support such a process.