South Korea candidates promise change

SEOUL, South Korea -- The liberal son of North Korean refugees faces the conservative daughter of a late dictator in South Korea's presidential election today. For all their differences, they hold similar views on the need to engage with Pyongyang, and other issues.

One big reason: Voters are deeply dissatisfied with President Lee Myung-bak, including with his hard-line stance on the authoritarian rival to the north. Park Geun-hye, who belongs to Lee's party, has had to tack to the center in her bid to become South Korea's first woman president.

Polls showed Park and Moon Jae-in in a dead heat before elections to lead Asia's fourth-largest economy and an important U.S. security bulwark in the region.

There's deepening worry about the economy and disgust over the alleged involvement of aides close to Lee in corruption scandals.

Many voters blame Lee's hardline views for encouraging North Korea to conduct nuclear and missile tests -- including Pyongyang's rocket launch last week. Some also say the chill in North-South relations led to two attacks in 2000 blamed on Pyongyang that killed 50 South Koreans.

Both candidates propose pulling back from Lee's insistence that engagement with North Korea be linked to so-far-nonexistent nuclear disarmament progress by Pyongyang. Park, however, insists on more conditions than Moon, who wants to restore large-scale government aid.

Moon is a former chief of staff to Lee's predecessor, late President Roh Moo-hyun, who championed the so-called "sunshine policy" of no-strings-attached aid for Pyongyang. -- AP