Pyongyang blasts Seoul over anti-communist leaflets

(ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead paras; UPDATES with remarks from Defense Ministry officials; RESTRUCTURES throughout)
By Byun Duk-kun
SEOUL, Oct. 27 (Yonhap) -- North Korea on Monday threatened to suspend its joint industrial project with South Korea, citing the increasing cross-border spread of anti-North Korea leaflets by South Korean civic organizations, the Defense Ministry said.

The communist North's latest threat came during a brief meeting of working-level
military officials from the divided Koreas, the second of its kind this month
since inter-Korean military dialogue resumed earlier this month after an
eight-month hiatus.
"The North Korean side pointed out that the spread of leaflets is on the rise and
demanded that our side take immediate measures to halt their distribution (in the
North)," Col. Lee Sang-cheol, head of the North Korea policy bureau at the
Defense Ministry, told reporters.
The meeting came at an unexpected proposal from the communist North, which has
cut off most of its official dialogue channels with the Seoul government since
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak was inaugurated in February.
Col. Lee earlier this month attended working-level dialogue with his North Korean
counterpart in the first military talks between the Koreas since January, but
that meeting ended in just a few hours as North Korean delegates used the venue
solely to criticize Seoul for spreading propaganda leaflets in the North that
slandered their leader Kim Jong-il.
"North Koreans today repeated exactly what they had said at that working-level
talks," Lee said, noting the communist nation had then threatened to halt the
joint industrial complex project in the North's border town of Kaesong if Seoul
failed to take steps to prevent the spread of what it called "propaganda
leaflets."
Monday's meeting, held on the roadside of a western route that crosses the
inter-Korean border, lasted less than 20 minutes, according to Won Tae-jae, a
spokesman for the Defense Ministry.
Pyongyang also demanded Seoul take measures to repair military hotlines between
the countries that have been out of operation since May and to provide necessary
equipment and materials to help modernize its communication systems, the ministry
said in a released statement.
"The North Korean side stressed the need to take immediate measures to repair the
military communication lines between the two and demanded the South Korean side
provide military communications equipment and materials," it said.
South Korea agreed late last year to help modernize the North's outdated
communications systems to secure better communication channels with the communist
state, but has yet to do so amid continued tension with Pyongyang, which
frequently calls the South Korean president a traitor.
"The Lee Myung-bak group's reckless suppression of the pro-reunification
democratic forces is a frontal challenge to the South Korean people who desire
new politics and new life, and a crime against the nation and reunification,"
Rodong Sinmun, a newspaper published by the North's ruling Workers' Party, said
in a commentary last week.
No significant agreement was reached at the brief contact held Monday, ministry
officials said, as the meeting was not aimed at discussing the pending issues,
but only to allow each side an opportunity to raise issues that need to be
addressed.
"The sides agreed to review each other's position exchanged at the contact once
they return to their side and concluded the contact," the ministry said.
The two Koreas are divided by the world's most heavily fortified border, a legacy
of the 1950-53 Korean War and one of the world's last Cold War front. The
countries are technically at war as the Korean War ended only with an armistice
treaty, not a peace agreement.
bdk@yna.co.kr
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