As Park Geun-hye searches for ways to compete with China and Japan, the South Korean president is eyeing a rather surprising ally: Kim Jong Un.
"Unification will allow the Korean economy to take a fresh leap forward and inject great vitality and energy," Park said on Jan. 10. "People would even sing, 'We dream of unification even in our dreams.' "
The idea isn't as dippy as it sounds. Economists generally rate Park's first year in office as a dud. She arrived at the presidential Blue House with big talk of building a more "creative" economy. Yet her plans to empower small and medium-size companies and to rein in the family-run conglomerates, or chaebol, that dominate the economy remain embryonic.