23 December '88

Didn’t go in the morning to the talks with [North Korean Foreign Minister] Kim Yong-nam, and lost out on much. The Korean stated that, according to Western sources, there was a meeting in Moscow between the countries of the [socialist] commonwealth, at which it was decided to establish diplomatic relations with South Korea, and to let Hungary go first for a start. Kim Yong-nam said that this is nothing but betrayal of the interests and ideals of socialism, crawling into the tiger’s mouth, capitulation before the power of the capital.

E[duard] A[mrosiyevich] [Shevardnadze] stiffened his mouth.

“These words of yours insult us. You either believe us or you don’t. There was no meeting. And, then, who gained from the absence of contacts with South Korea? It itself lost nothing by it, but we can’t say the same thing about ourselves. You say that there is a crisis. But what, there is no crisis in the Soviet Union?!”

[…]