Preparations for talks between North and South Korea have begun
Channel: Александр Юрьевич Чукланов
Date: 2018-04-18

Preparations for talks between North and South Korea have begun
Why is Korea divided? The history of the war-torn peninsula as North and South prepare for talks
Everything you need to know about the divide between the two countries and the war that cemented it
North and South Korea are set to hold their first summit in more than a decade after high-level talks.
It will be only the third meeting between the leaders of the two countries since the Korean War.
It is a warming in relations between the nations, which have never signed a peace treaty despite the conflict ending in the 1950s.
South Korea's president Moon Jae-in, who came to power in May, had pledged to engage North Korea in talks in a bid to dial down their neighbour's nuclear ambitions.
And in a recent and unexpected visit to China , North Korea's Kim Jong-Un reportedly maintained he is committed 'denuclearisation'.
But the divisions between the two countries stretch back to the end of World War II, and are based on political ideology as well as bloody conflict.
And while the South has flourished in recent years as a democracy supported by the United States, the North has seen isolation from the international community and has pursued an aggressive military-first policy.
Here's an overview of the origins of the divide, the bitter war that cemented it, and their differing fortunes since.
Japanese rule and World War Two
The short-lived Korean Empire had been integrating more with the Empire of Japan at the end of the 19th Century, and by 1905 a treaty formally made Korea a protectorate of Japan.
Japan annexed the country with another treaty in 1910, officially taking over sovereignty of its land and people. A Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea was set up in exile in China by those opposed to Japanese rule.
In Korea, a series of anti-Japanese protests were put down by soldiers, and over the next decades Japan strengthened its military rule of the peninsula.
Following the Sino-Japanese war of 1937 and the outbreak of World War II Japan's rulers cracked down on Korean culture, and stopped the teaching of the Korean language and history.
During World War II , tens of thousands of Korean men were conscripted into the Japanese military.
Up to up to 200,000 girls and women, mainly from Korea and China, were forced into sexual slavery for Japanese soldiers as so-called "comfort women".
The Provisional Government organised resistance groups against the colonial rulers. In 1940 the Korean Liberation Army was formed as the government declared war on Japan and Germany. Japan surrendered in 1945 after the United States dropped atomic bombs on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, ending the Second World War.
Following the unconditional surrender of the Japanese, the victorious Allies split the Korean peninsula into two occupational zones. The United States took over the area to the south of the 38th Parallel, while the Soviet Union took the area to the north.
The original plan was to work towards a united independent Korea, but the Soviet-US joint commission overseeing the transition failed to come to agreement as Cold War tensions between the two superpowers deepened.
Fearing communist expansion in the region, the US established a military government in the south, while the Soviets oversaw the formation of the Provisional People's Committee led by Kim Il-Sung in the north.
In the north, land was redistributed amongst the people, and key industries were nationalised. The US military government said hundreds of thousands fled south as refugees.
By 1947, the US brought the issue of what to do with the peninsula to the UN, against the wishes of the Soviet Union.
The UN passed a resolution stating that free elections should be held and foreign troops withdrawn. The Soviet Union boycotted the vote.
Elections were planned in the south only, but strikes and protests broke out as activists feared separate elections would lead to the permanent division of the country. An uprising against the plans by Jeju islanders from April 1948 was met with force by the South Korean military, resulting in up to 30,000 people being killed - around 10 per cent of the island's population.
The general election went ahead in May 1948, and in August, the Republic of Korea officially took over from the US military. The first president, anti-communist Syngman Rhee, had previously been head of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea.
In response, in September 1948 the Democratic People's Republic of Korea was declared in the north, with Kim Il-Sung as leader. Both governments claimed sovereignty of the whole of the Korean peninsular.
Soviet forces withdrew from the North in 1948, while US troops pulled out in 1949.
The Korean War
On June 25, 1950, North Korean forces crossed the 38th Parallel and headed south following a string of bloody border clashes between the two countries.