South Korea’s president, Lee Myung-bak, has urged North Korea to replicate Myanmar’s political and economic reforms as a first step towards peaceful reunification of the Korean peninsula.
Mr Lee, who has less than eight months left of his single five-year term, said the North’s enforced leadership change at the end of last year provided the communist state with a “good opportunity” to follow Myanmar’s example.
Asked by journalists about the possibility of the North’s collapse under its new leader Kim Jong-eun, Mr Lee said it was not appropriate to talk of such a scenario and stressed that North Korea should revive its economy for an eventual reunification.