Hyundai Asan, which installed the communications equipment, has come to the aid of the North Korean regime before. A 2000 summit held between President Kim Dae-jung of South Korea and Kim Jong-il of North Korea in Pyongyang, North Korea was made possible by a $500 million payment made to the communist dictator by this South Korean company. Chung Mong-hyun, Hyundai heir, committed suicide in 2003 after an investigation disclosed his money transfer to North Korea. He also had been criticized for investing corporate funds in what turned out to be unprofitable enterprises in North Korea such as scenic tours, mining, industrial complexes and construction.

His actions and those of his company pale in comparison to certain actions of the South Korean government to prop up the regime in the North. In 1998, former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung started a Sunshine policy that aimed to encourage interaction and economic assistance between the Communist government of North Korea and the democratic government of South Korea. South Korea would offer humanitarian aid without any expectations of reciprocity. The South Korean government promised not to absorb North Korea or undermine its government. It would support peaceful co-existence, not regime change or reunification. To many South Koreans, it looked like a completely one-sided deal with all of the benefits accruing to North Korea.

The Sunshine Policy didn’t end after Kim Dae-jung left office. The current South Korean, President Roh Moo-hyun, and his administration are working towards a greater friendship with their northern neighbor. President Roh apologized to North Korea when protestors in the South demonstrated against the Communist government. Prime Minister Lee Hae-chan on Oct. 2005 declared that his government opposes regime change because a unified country would lower the gross domestic income level of the combined countries. Current South Korean textbooks portray North Korea positively while describing the American army as occupiers, not liberators, even though it was the United States which rescued South Korean from a Communist takeover during the Korean war. Park Kyung-seo, the South Korean human rights official for the government, denounced the UN for declaring North Korea a human rights abuser. At an interview last November he said, "I feel something wrong in calling for people’s civil rights in front of North Koreans who are starving to death because of a lack of food." The appeasement policy of the North by the South Korean government clearly isn