Posted on 05/27/2010 6:41:21 AM PDT by jhpigott
North Korea Scraps Military Safeguards with South
Kurt Achin | Seoul 27 May 2010
In a sharp escalation of tensions with South Korea, North Korea says it is discarding military procedures the two sides have agreed to follow for years to ensure a conflict does not get out of hand.
The general staff of the North Korean People's Army issued a notice Thursday dismantling a wide range of security guarantees it has observed for years.
Pyongyang says it will completely nullify a bilateral agreement with the South that was put in place to prevent clashes in waters west of the Korean peninsula. That is the maritime region where North Korea has disputed a sea border for decades and where an international team of investigators concluded a North Korean submarine sank a South Korean patrol ship in March, killing 46 sailors.
The North says it will stop using maritime shortwave radio frequencies with the South and cut off other means of emergency communication.
That warning came as South Korea's navy conducted anti-submarine warfare drills off its west coast. South Korea and the United States have announced they will conduct a joint anti-submarine exercise, widely expected to take place within a matter of weeks.
The North Korean military notice, carried on state-run media, also said South Korean ships and aircraft will no longer be allowed passage through the North's territorial space. Pyongyang says it may also prevent access into or out of a joint industrial complex in the North Korean city, Kaesong, potentially trapping hundreds of South Korean business managers there.
Thursday's notice is the latest unraveling of inter-Korean agreements put in place since a historic 2000 summit to ease tensions and encourage exchanges between the two sides. Yang Moo-jin, a scholar with the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, says the North is "playing hard ball".
He says North Korea's actions block any exchange of people and resources between the Koreas. He says it is an all-out shutdown.
Regularly scheduled tours of South Korea's side of the heavily armed inter-Korean border were abruptly curtailed Thursday after the North's announcement came out, as a safety precaution.
Professor Yang says the situation could easily escalate.
He says the power struggle taking place between the two Korea's could result in what he says could be "some of the most terrible things to happen since the Korean War".
1) Pyongyang nullifies a bilateral agreement with the South that was put in place to prevent clashes in waters west of the Korean peninsula. The North says it will stop using maritime shortwave radio frequencies with the South and cut off other means of emergency communication.
2) South Korean ships and aircraft will no longer be allowed passage through the North's territorial space.
3) Looks like a hostage situation may be taking shape at the Kaesong industrial complex
4) Regularly scheduled tours of South Korea's side of the heavily armed inter-Korean border were cancelled
ping
Ping.
Human shields, or they'll be charges as spies and murdered.
Why any of them voluntarily went there is absolutely beyond me.
Who will blink first???
War is often used as a safety valve for failed domestic policies.
Human shields, or they’ll be charges as spies and murdered. ................................................. Only if they willingly confess to spying, which they certainly will, after being interrogated. Without of course, being tortured in anyway to get them to confess. They will be allowed to have an attorney and they will be read their rights before any interrogation takes place. After all, it is the “DEMOCRATIC” (all blue) Republic of Korea.
I believe the Chinese head of state is supposed to be in Seoul this weekend. Don’t see anything happening until that meeting shakes itself out - but after that, all bets off
War in one week, so I think. There is little more short of war that can happen. We better pray to God that Obama doesn’t screw this one up.
great pic!!!!
NK leadership appears more than a little unstable.
Looks like I picked the wrong time to buy a Hyundai.
More likely he went there for help in his internal power stuggle, and was rebuffed. China is currently trying hard for a free trade ageement with the south. China buys a ton of South Korean stuff. The south runs 32 billion a year trade surplus with china.
South Koreas GNP is about 45 times that of the north in size. China’s northstar is about business. They won’t do a thing that endangers their critical trade with South Korea, or the USA.
I think everyone kind of knows that the Norks are a wacky hermit cult, and are just waiting till they collapse. Then Korean families will be reunited, and the South gets the keys to a backwards population with no infrastructure.
That’s an awfully big gamble for China. If this is true, and Kim caught word of it, it could explain the developing situation.
Even if China had backing for a coup from a portion of the NK military, I would all but guarantee Kim still has enough support from the remainder of his military to initiate a conflict to stop the coup.
I wouldn’t be so sure that President Lee will cast his lot with the Chinese. He is of a different mold than his predecessors.
” Looks like I picked the wrong time to buy a Hyundai. “
It might be worth something as a collectors’ item, someday - “Last Production Model Before the Factory Was Shelled Into a Smoking Crater”, or some such.....
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