N. Korea maintains ban on visit to Kaesong complex

(ATTN: UPDATES with spokesman's latest quotes, defectors to fly anti-Pyongyang
leaflets)
By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, March 16 (Yonhap) -- North Korea continued its ban on South Korean visits
to a joint industrial complex Monday while allowing some workers to return home,
officials said, in what appeared to be its latest attempt to change Seoul's
hard-line policy.

North Korea closed the border twice last week and briefly reopened it for a few
days as a U.S.-South Korean military exercise got underway in and around South
Korea.
Hundreds of South Korean workers were virtually stranded over the weekend in the
joint complex in North Korea's border town of Kaesong, sparking skepticism about
doing business in the communist state. On Monday, three days after it closed the
border for a second time, the North sent a message to South Korea saying it would
allow South Korean workers to come back.
"North Korea is entirely responsible for the current situation," Unification
Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyoun said.
The ministry said among the 453 people scheduled to come back, 294 people have
returned, and the rest decided to stay because of a labor shortage in Kaesong.
New visits to the complex were not allowed, threatening production at scores of
factories that are running out of raw materials. Officials were still unsure
whether crossings will resume Tuesday.
Seoul was cautious about speculating on North Korean intentions. "We have our
analysis on the situation, but I don't like to say things that may not be
helpful," the spokesman said.
More than 650 South Korean commuters scheduled to visit Kaesong waited in vain in
the South Korean transit office for North Korea's approval.
A total of 93 South Korean firms operate in the Kaesong industrial complex, just
an hour's drive from Seoul, employing about 39,000 North Koreans who produce
clothes, watches, kitchenware, electronic equipment and other labor-intensive
goods. Their combined output was US$250 million last year.
The Kaesong complex, an outcome of the first inter-Korean summit in 2000, is the
only reconciliatory project that remains. Other projects -- tours to the North's
scenic Mount Kumgang and historic sites in Kaesong, Korea's ancient capital --
were all suspended last year.
Analysts believe North Korea is protesting the U.S.-South Korean military
exercise, as well as what it calls South Korea's "confrontational" policy.
"North Korea is expressing its discontent over Lee's tough policy in general. But
it is also very much mindful of public opinion in South Korea, which began
calling the issue a 'hostage crisis,'" said Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea studies
professor at Dongguk University in Seoul.
North Korea cut off the last remaining official phone and fax channel with South
Korea last week, denouncing the March 9-20 joint exercise as a rehearsal for a
"second Korean War."
The North has also warned it can no longer guarantee the safety of South Korean
passenger jets in its airspace while the annual joint exercise is underway.
North Korean media made no mention of the border closure, but repeated its
denunciations of President Lee Myung-bak's policy.
"It is great irony that those who bedeviled the inter-Korean relations by
blocking dialogue ... have now the effrontery to raise their heads and talk about
'dialogue,'" the Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the ruling Worker's
Party, said in a commentary Monday.
"The reality clearly proves that the inter-Korean ties will never be improved as
long as such most wicked confrontational maniacs, traitors to the nation as Lee
stay in power," it said.
The North's latest measure sharpened conservative calls in Seoul to shut down the
industrial complex.
"The government should no longer be fooled by North Korean tricks," Lee
Hoi-chang, chairman of the right-wing opposition Liberty Forward Party, said,
urging Seoul to consider closing the Kaesong complex should the border remain
closed.
In a move certain to provoke North Korea, a group of North Korean defectors said
they will fly about 100,000 leaflets criticizing leader Kim Jong-il into the
communist state on Tuesday.
Inter-Korean relations have disintegrated to their lowest point in a decade since
President Lee took office a year ago, adopting a tougher stance on North Korea's
nuclear program and ending his liberal predecessors' policy of unconditional aid.
The presidential office and Cabinet ministers have upped criticism about the
North's planned rocket launch, saying it will draw U.N. sanctions regardless of
whether it is carrying a satellite or a missile.
Pyongyang has said it will put a communications satellite into orbit and notified
international aviation and maritime agencies that the launch will take place
sometime between April 4-8. There has been conflicting speculation about the
nature of what Pyongyang is assembling, especially given its past missile
activity.
Pyongyang has warned any foreign attempt to shoot down its rocket would lead to a
war on the Korean Peninsula.
hkim@yna.co.kr
(END)