President Yoon Suk Yeol has criticized his predecessor’s “obsession” with Pyongyang for influencing the previous administration’s North Korea policy.

In an interview with The New York Times conducted last Wednesday and published on Sunday, Yoon likened former President Moon Jae-in to a “student obsessed with only one friend in his classroom.”

In addition to his “bold initiative” earlier proposed to the North promising economic assistance in return for denuclearization, Yoon stressed that South Korea and the U.S. are prepared to bring “a package of all possible means and methods” to avoid a war, including the U.S. nuclear umbrella.

Chiding the Moon administration’s stance between the U.S. and China as “too ambiguous,” Yoon said he would pursue predictability through strengthened “extended deterrence” based on solid South Korea-U.S. alliance, although he cautioned that such moves are not aimed at Beijing.

Ahead of a possible summit with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly this week, Yoon also stressed the inevitability of expanding trilateral security cooperation among Seoul, Washington and Tokyo to cope with the growing North Korean nuclear threat, expressing hope of striking a “grand bargain” with Tokyo to mend bilateral ties.