LOS ANGELES: As South Korean President Kim Dae Jung nears the end of his term in office, a rare opportunity for progress toward meaningful peace on the Korean peninsula may be slipping from our grasp. By all reports, his “sunshine policy” toward the North - a significant factor in the decision to award him the Nobel Peace Prize in 2000 - has been obscured by gathering storm clouds.

Whatever one’s view of the world at large, it is clear that the Korean peninsula is one place where a bipolar division between north and south is strongly evident. In every respect, these two entities constitute the yin and yang of Korean national identity. Ironically, this bifurcation is an outgrowth of a Cold War that is receding from memory elsewhere in the world. Conditions should be right for an easing of relations, but the tensions instead are being reinforced and buttressed by a new global bipolarity. This situation is dangerous to world peace.

Kim Dae Jung personifies a unique historical moment. His demonstrated courage over decades of persecution by military governments in South Korea are unlikely to be matched by his successors, however distinguished they may prove to be.

If Kim Dae Jung is unable to persuade his most important ally of the viability of a sunshine policy, how can we expect any future leader of South Korea to persuade its most steadfast foe that the prospects for peace are genuine? Although the threat from North Korea is real, it is a mistake to cast it in the same light as Al Qaeda.

The answer to this tense situation is to diffuse the existing bipolarity rather than reinforce it. The key to such diffusion lies with Russia and China, the same powers that helped create the bipolarity that still defines Korea.

The US should work with Russia and China to explore opportunities for regional economic cooperation with North and South Korea. Let us take cue from the winter solstice and not allow our own cloudy thinking to eclipse the waxing potential of South Korea’s sunshine policy. —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) Los Angeles Times.