April 27, 2018 Crossing over the border between the two Koreas, the leader of North Korea Kim Jong-Un became the first North Korean leader to set foot on South Korean soil. Many pictures and videos of the two presidents were taken in the truce village of Panmunjom, the center of the demilitarized zone, as they both crossed the once-bloodstained border into North Korea before crossing into South Korea for their summit meeting. The two men wrote history as they shared a deep conversation on the blue bridge where they spent around a lengthy thirty minutes discussing the matters of denuclearization and peace between the two countries. The meeting, referred to as the Inter-Korean Summit, also resulted in the signing of the Panmunjom Declaration for Peace--which states that the two countries will put an end to their hostile activities towards each other and work towards a new path for peace--ending the sixty-eight year old Korean War put on hold by the Korean Armistice Agreement signed back in 1953. The summit came to an end with a light show projected on the Peace House with “One dream, one Korea” performed on the piano by South Korean singer Minah.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang praised North and South Korea on their “successful summit,” while Chinese President Xi JinPing and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe praised American President Trump for playing a big role in bringing the two split Koreas together. Since the summit, North Korea has been showing signs of moving towards peace, one of them being the release of three detainees (Kim Dong Chul, Kim Hak Song, and Kim Sang Guk) on Wednesday, May 9. President Trump personally welcomed the three detainees home to America as well as announcing the time and place of the next anticipated summit with North Korea with great optimism. After much consideration, it was decided that the next summit will take place on June 12, in Singapore a “small and highly prosperous island nation, [that] has been used before for high-profile diplomatic occasions”, according to BBC. It is predicted that their main issue to be discussed will be North Korea’s nuclear weapon program. President Trump shows his hopefulness through his tweet : “We will both try to make it a very special moment for World Peace”

<Juwon Chun Granada Hills Charter High 10th Grade>