On 14 February 2024, the representatives of the ROK and Cuba at the United Nations exchanged diplomatic notes in New York, marking the establishment of official relations. Cuba became the 193rd country with which the ROK established diplomatic relations.
According to the ROK presidential office, the event was the culmination of Seoul’s diplomatic efforts to establish relations with socialist countries that have traditionally maintained friendly contacts with the DPRK. In this regard, Seoul believes that this will deal a significant political, psychological and reputational blow to Pyongyang.
What did Cuba’s relations with the two Koreas look like?
In 2012, a Korean language course was opened at the University of Havana, but it was closed in 2018 due to various factors in the country.
Cuba recognised the government of South Korea in 1949, but no formal diplomatic relations were established. The two countries severed ties in 1959 following the Cuban Revolution, when Fidel Castro came to power. Since the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1960, Cuba and North Korea have maintained close fraternal ties based on their shared values of anti-Americanism and anti-imperialism.
In March 1986, Fidel Castro visited North Korea at the invitation of Kim Il Sung, and in 2018, Cuba’s new president, Miguel Diaz-Canel, visited North Korea. In April 2021, when Diaz-Canel was elected first secretary of the Cuban Communist Party, Kim Jong Un sent him a congratulatory message. In January 2024, on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, Kim expressed his hope to further strengthen bilateral relations between the two countries. That same month, Cuba’s new ambassador to North Korea, Eduardo Luis Garcia Correa, took up his post. On 31 January he presented his credentials to Choe Ryong Hae, chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly.
Cuba is one of the DPRK’s long-standing allies, although bilateral relations are not as active due to the distance and the small size of the two countries’ economies. North Korean state media often report positively on Cuban affairs. Following the death of former Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 2016, Kim called him a ‘comrade-in-arms’ and visited the Cuban embassy in Pyongyang to pay his respects. For more on North Korea-Cuba relations, see articles by the author’s colleague A.L. Polenova.
South Korea has been proposing formal relations with Cuba since the early 2000s, and has had a trade mission in Havana since 2005. This is believed to have been influenced by the “Korean wave”. In 2016, during the Park Geun-hye administration, then foreign minister Yoon Beng-se travelled to the country for the first time.
Cuba is now home to about 1,100 people of Korean descent who moved from Mexico during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean peninsula in the early 1920s. Before the coronavirus pandemic, an average of about 14,000 South Koreans visited Cuba each year.
What is known about the negotiations?
After coming to power following the long reign of the Castro brothers, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel embarked on a number of reforms and Cuba established diplomatic relations with the United States in 2015.
A foreign ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the talks to normalise Cuban-South Korean diplomatic relations were held in secret amid a wave of Yoon Suk Yeol’s policy to raise the ROK’s international profile as a ‘global Korea’. This was done through the channels of the UN mission in New York and the two countries’ embassies in Mexico. In addition, former Foreign Minister Park Chin had three contacts with high-ranking Cuban officials last year. The final agreement was reached during the recent Lunar New Year celebrations.
“The decision to establish official relations between the two states was taken in accordance with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, international law and the spirit and rules of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 18 April 1961,” the press release said. In a separate press release, the ROK Foreign Ministry expressed its expectation that official relations with Cuba would be a “decisive turning point” in its efforts to strengthen diplomacy with Central and South America.
Cuba is now the 193rd country with which South Korea has established diplomatic relations. The two countries’ authorities plan to discuss the reciprocal opening of diplomatic missions.
What made Havana take this decisive step? Seoul believes there are several factors:
- Coupled with increased economic exchanges between Seoul and Havana, the number of Korean tourists in Cuba continued to rise, as did the impact of the Korean wave. This called for some kind of action.
- Amid the growing likelihood of Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election in November, Cuba is looking for allies: “Trump’s pursuit of hardline policies, such as designating Cuba a state sponsor of terrorism, has intensified the challenges facing the island nation.
- It was not without routine statements that “Cuba prioritises pragmatic needs and economic cooperation over ideological alliances”.
What benefits can RK have from a new partner?
On 18 February 2024, a spokesman for the ROK presidential administration said that establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba would have a positive impact on the South Korean economy, and provided a list of possible benefits:
- Cuba has significant mineral resources necessary for battery production, such as cobalt and nickel (the fourth and fifth largest reserves in the world). South Korean companies will be able to utilise Cuba’s vast reserves of natural resources if the US lifts the economic and trade embargo.
- The South Korean presidential administration will assist domestic businesses in entering the Cuban market, especially in the areas of basic necessities, household appliances and industrial equipment, given the shortage of such goods due to Washington’s economic sanctions against Havana. In addition, South Korean companies may explore opportunities for increased co-operation in sectors such as consumer goods, electronics and machinery, food, communications and communication services.
- Another promising area of co-operation is energy, as Cuba, which suffers from a chronic shortage of electricity, is looking for ways to expand its power generation capacity, including the use of renewable energy sources.
- Medicine and biotechnology were also identified as potential sectors for future economic and research co-operation between the two countries.
- It is also possible to supply Cuban agricultural and fish products to the Republic of Kazakhstan.
- Havana’s inclusion in the Official Development Assistance (ODA) programme would open up opportunities for cooperation in the use of the Cuban professional workforce (medicine, bio-industry) and joint research and development in clinical medicine.
Seoul recognises, however, that direct trade with Cuba has been severely restricted by US sanctions, forcing goods and money to pass through third countries such as Panama. Over time, however, Havana could become a promising market with promising development opportunities.
There is also a political aspect that has begun to be discussed in the media: ‘North Korea seems to be anticipating significant opportunities due to Trump’s potential election victory, and is seeking direct dialogue with the US, sidelining South Korea. If this scenario unfolds, Cuba could potentially play a mediating role between the two Koreas”.
Meanwhile, a representative of the Korean Cultural Centre in Havana said on 18 February that a Korean language course would open on a trial basis at a Cuban art college in March.
The ROK plans to open a consulate in Cuba in the near future to assist South Koreans visiting the country. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, about 14,000 South Koreans visited Cuba annually.
What was the DPRK’s reaction?
Usually, the KCNA reacts very quickly to any anti-North Korean demarches. However, at the time we are writing this text, there is nothing about the establishment of diplomatic relations between Havana and Seoul on the KCNA. Not even at the level of mentioning “one country” that has behaved ungratefully.
Nevertheless, ROK media claimed that state media reports of events attended by foreign diplomats did not mention the Cuban ambassador to North Korea, while a photo published by the Russian Embassy in North Korea showed the Cuban ambassador present. This seemed unusual, and experts said that “North Korea may not openly express its grievances against Cuba, but its relationship with Cuba may no longer be what it used to be, as Seoul and Havana established official ties at a time when Pyongyang has identified South Korea as its main enemy.”
Be that as it may, there are now only two states that have diplomatic relations with the North and none with the South – Syria and partially recognised Palestine.
How do experts view this move and what does the author think?
South Korean Pyongyangologists and journalists describe the situation with a level of unwarranted euphoria as if Havana had not only established diplomatic relations with Seoul, but had severed them with Pyongyang. “It seems inevitable that North Korea will inevitably suffer a significant political and psychological blow“.
Conservative media came out with headlines like “North Korea’s isolation in the global community deepens”. Jeong Seong-chang, a senior fellow at the Sejong Institute, called Cuba’s decision the biggest diplomatic failure since Kim Jong-un came to power: “North Korean leaders must have felt shocked and betrayed. They probably did not expect this to happen.”
Park Won-gon, a professor at Ihwa Women’s University, sees Cuba’s new relationship with South Korea as further isolating the North for the following reason: “Kim Jong-un is trying to create a new Cold War structure, an anti-American bloc with countries that share this approach, but South Korea’s establishment of diplomatic relations with Cuba has somewhat impeded this move…. This could be interpreted as South Korea achieving its diplomatic goal of sending a clear message to the North that provocative actions will not work and urging the North to break out of isolation “if it wants to be treated as a ‘normal state’.”
The conservative Chun’an Ilbo ran with the headline “North Korea should learn from Cuba.” Havana chose Seoul as a partner, even though North Korea has defined the ROK as a “sworn enemy.” This means that “nuclear weapons and missiles cannot secure a dictatorship based on hereditary transfer of power. Cuba has shown that the best way to survive is to accept the changing times and take the revisionist path.”
According to Alexander Zhebin, a leading researcher at the Centre for Korean Studies, the establishment of diplomatic relations with Cuba can be seen as an instrument of psychological pressure on Pyongyang by Seoul. “South Koreans care about any country that had relations with the DPRK in order to prick the North Koreans. I do not rule out that with Cuba, they may have even taken concrete steps to stimulate these diplomatic relations. In particular, South Korea promised to promote infrastructure development in Central American countries to increase employment there and reduce the flow of refugees to the United States. This was a very concrete gesture of assistance to the states. Cuba may be included in this programme and develop infrastructure facilities there as part of an apparently very noble programme”.
In the author’s opinion, it is not necessary to draw analogies of the class “one more country broke off relations with Taiwan and concluded them with the PRC”. The North is not chasing the number of countries in which it keeps embassies at any cost, and the two main states that support the DPRK (China and Russia) have diplomatic relations with both the North and the South, and Pyongyang has not reprimanded them on this matter.
The ROK media constantly mused that “the number of North Korea’s foreign missions has dropped to 44 at the end of 2023 from 53 at the beginning of the same year. This represents Pyongyang’s further isolation in the international community, due in large part to its relentless pursuit of nuclear weapons.” In each case of embassy closures though, it was a) not a breakdown of diplomatic relations and b) all carried out at the initiative of Pyongyang optimising its diplomatic service.
Yes, Seoul can say it has won some diplomatic victory, but time will tell the effect.
Konstantin ASMOLOV, candidate of historical sciences, leading researcher at the center for Korean studies, Institute of China and Contemporary Asia of the RAS, especially for online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”