(6th LD) N. Korea scraps agreement on sea border with S. Korea

SEOUL, Jan. 30 (Yonhap) -- North Korea said Friday it is scrapping all political and military agreements with South Korea and declared their western sea border void, sharply raising tensions to their highest levels in nearly two decades.

Pyongyang revived tensions of the Cold War era ahead of key political events in
the communist state and envisioned negotiations with regional powers on its
nuclear weapons program. Seoul expressed "deep regret" and urged Pyongyang to
agree to dialogue.
"The group of traitors has already reduced all the agreements reached between the
north and the south in the past to dead documents," the North's Committee for the
Peaceful Reunification of Korea, a body handling inter-Korean affairs, said,
referring to the Lee Myung-bak government in Seoul.
"Under such a situation it is self-evident that there is no need for the DPRK to
remain bound to those north-south agreements," it said in a statement carried by
the North's official Korean Central News Agency. DPRK is the acronym for the
North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
By denying the landmark Basic Agreement, North Korea removed a basic safeguard to
prevent military clashes with the South and seeks to nullify the sea border,
which was drawn with U.S. involvement.
The Basic Agreement, reached between prime ministers in 1991 and ratified the
following year, put an end to the Cold War confrontation and boosted
reconciliatory efforts, laying the groundwork for the inter-Korean summits in
2000 and 2007. The accord particularly sought to reduce military tension along
the western maritime border in the Yellow Sea, which had remained volatile since
the Korean War.
The western sea border, called the Northern Limit Line, was unilaterally drawn by
the U.S.-led United Nations Command at the end of the 1950-53 war, and North
Korea insists it should be redrawn farther south.
Bloody naval clashes occurred there in 1999 and 2002, claiming the lives of
scores of soldiers on both sides.
"First, all the agreed points concerning the issue of putting an end to the
political and military confrontation between the north and the south will be
nullified," North Korea said, and "the points on the military boundary line in
the West Sea stipulated in its appendix will be nullified."
The threat comes just days after leader Kim Jong-il said he "does not want to see
tension emerge on the Korean Peninsula" in a meeting with a visiting Chinese
official.
Kim's 67th birthday is approaching in coming weeks, an event that has usually
motivated the North's military to display its loyalty to Kim. North Korea will
also hold parliamentary elections in March that may prompt a power shift.
Put on heightened alert, South Korea braced for a possible naval clash, but no
unusual signs were spotted along the border, the military said.
North Korean commercial boats continued passing through the strait off South
Korea's southern island of Jeju under a 2005 shipping treaty, officials said.
"Our government expresses deep regret to North Korea," Kim Ho-nyoun, spokesman
for the Unification Ministry handling North Korean affairs, said, "We urge North
Korea to accept our call for dialogue as soon as possible."
Any attempt by North Korea to violate the sea border will face firm
counteraction, said Won tae-jae, spokesman for the Ministry of National Defense.
Kim Young-soo, a political science professor at Sogang University, said North
Korea may try to trigger military skirmishes to draw attention of the new Barack
Obama administration in the U.S.
"It is a message both to South Korea and the United States," he said. "Pyongyang
is saying to Washington, 'We won't wait for U.S. engagement. We'll find a
solution by driving the situation to the brink of a catastrophe.'"
In recent weeks, Pyongyang has issued a series of blistering statements vowing to
retain its nuclear weapons program until the U.S. removes military threats
against the North.
The brinkmanship appeared to be an attempt to draw Washington's attention to
stalled nuclear negotiations, as the new U.S. administration is juggling an
economic downtown and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Obama vowed to work with "old allies and former foes" to lessen the nuclear
threat, a departure from George W. Bush, who rejected engagement with foes
throughout most of his years in office.
Regional powers -- South Korea, China, Japan and Russia -- are waiting for the
new U.S. administration to roll out its North Korea policy and move forward the
six-party talks aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear program. The latest round
of the talks in December broke down due to the dispute over how to verify
Pyongyang's nuclear activities.
While seeking dialogue with Washington, Pyongyang raised inter-Korean tension to
its highest level since the Cold War era. It lashed out at Lee's recent
nomination of a hawkish scholar as Seoul's new unification minister as a
"declaration to the world it will oppose us to the end."
Hyun In-taek, a political science professor at Korea University, was a key
architect of Lee's North Korea policy linking economic aid to Pyongyang's
denuclearization. In line with that policy, Lee suspended South Korea's customary
rice and fertilizer aid to the North.
For North Korea, Hyun's appointment signaled Lee's hard-line stance will get even
tougher in his second year in office, analysts said.
"The North is sensing that South Korea's government is becoming more
conservative," Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea professor at Dongguk University, said.
"North Korea is saying that it won't just sit and watch."
hkim@yna.co.kr
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