The U.S. government has tapped Sung Kim, a Korean-American State Department official, as its new ambassador to Seoul, diplomatic sources said over the weekend, a move that is expected to have positive influence over bilateral ties and ongoing efforts to denuclearize North Korea.

Once the nomination is officially confirmed, the 51-year-old diplomat will become the first U.S. ambassador to Seoul of Korean heritage.

“The U.S. government has requested a diplomatic agreement from the South Korean government to the nomination earlier this week,” a diplomatic source in Washington said on the condition of anonymity.

The nomination of Kim is “a decision symbolizing stronger, upgraded ties” between the longstanding allies, a Seoul official said, asking not to be named until the nomination becomes official.

“The announcement will be well-received by Korean society and the general public,” he said. 

The nomination of Kim, an expert on the Korean Peninsula, comes as inter-Korean tensions have been running high since North Korea’s deadly provocations last year.

Kim has served as Washington’s special envoy for the multinational talks aimed at North Korea’s denuclearization since 2008. The six-nation talks, involving the two Koreas, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia, have been stalled for more than two years, causing regional concerns over Pyongyang’s ongoing nuclear ambitions.

Dialogue partners have been escalating discussions over when and how to resume the long-suspended negotiations, but lingering tensions between the two Koreas have been serving as a major stumbling block.

Kim, born 1960 in South Korea, emigrated to the U.S. in the 1970s after his father retired from his post in the government and obtained U.S. citizenship in 1980.

A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, Kim went to Loyola School of Law and served as a state prosecutor before changing his profession to a diplomat.

Since 2003, when he began to work as a first secretary at the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, Kim attended several rounds of the six-way nuclear disarmament talks and visited Pyongyang more than 10 times as a key North Korean expert in Washington. Kim was also picked to head the Office of Korean Affairs at the State Department in 2006 by Christopher Hill, who has been an assistant secretary of state for East Asia and an ambassador to Seoul.

“His expertise in Korean affairs was apparently taken into account by the White House,” another source in Washington said.

South Korea expects Kim to play a positive role in strengthening bilateral cooperation as Seoul and Washington continue their efforts to resolve the current standoff over North Korea’s nuclear programs, officials here said.

Kim’s vast experience on various pending issues including North Korea’s nuclear programs and Washington-Seoul military alliance will bring help “improve what can be improved and maintain what is good,” an unnamed official here said.

Making clear it will no longer try to engage South Korea in dialogue, Pyongyang vowed to launch “retaliatory military actions” on Friday, a threat Seoul echoed by saying any future attacks would be met by a “very strong response.”

“Proactive deterrence means that if there is a provocation, we will respond very strongly,” Seoul’s defense chief Kim Kwan-jin told a regional security conference in Singapore.

North Korea torpedoed a South Korean warship and bombarded a western border island in March and November, respectively, killing up to 50 South Koreans including two civilians.

Instead of apologizing for the attacks as demanded by both Seoul and Washington, Pyongyang has been stepping up a hostile rhetoric against the South since last week.

By Shin Hae-in (hayney@heraldcorp.com)