몽골의 영세중립화 논의에 대한 종합적 검토

A Comprehensive Review of the Discussion on Mongolia’s Permanent Neutrality: Centered on Media Reports

The purpose of this paper is to review the media reports inside and outside Mongolia regarding the permanent neutrality policy that drew the interest of the Mongolian and international society for the past year and a half, and to comprehensively study the contents and future prospects of the discussion on the permanent neutrality based on the review. Many discussions took place immediately after President Ts. Elbegdorj of Mongolia proposed the permanent neutrality policy in September 7 th 2015, and the controversy, though its intensity has lessened, continues to this day. It is said that approximately 80 specialist editorials and press interviews and 19 debates took place within the six months from the President’s proposition to March 18th 2016, though the numbers may not be totally accurate. This shows there was a lot of discussion within a short period of time, which indicates the tremendous amount of attention the topic received. On a different level, there exists a complexly entwined structure of conflicts between factions regarding Mongolia’s foreign policy, and competition between the two neighbors(China and Russia) and the third neighbors(USA, Japan, Germany, India, South Korea etc.). Therefore, reviewing the pros and cons of the permanent neutrality policy will be of great assistance to understanding the essence of Mongolia’s foreign policy, the position of each faction concerning the issue, and the positions of the two neighbors and the third neighbors regarding Mongolia etc. The discussion of this paper starts from this point. The discussion is developed in the order of the pros and cons of the permanent neutrality policy and the response of the international society. The primary data used in this paper was limited to media reports on the issue, including published articles and interviews by experts, simple reports and editorials written by journalists. This was to hear the real opinions of experts regarding this topic and due to the judgement that press editorials and interviews would be sufficient in comprehending the thoughts of the experts.