Air Force chief scraps sales trip due to N. Korea woes: official

By Sam Kim

SEOUL, March 20 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's air force chief has indefinitely postponed his overseas trip aimed at pitching the country's aircraft because of North Korea concerns, an official said Friday.

Gen. Lee Kye-hoon, Air Force Chief of Staff, was initially set to begin his 9-day
trip on Friday to Turkey and Oman but canceled it because of high-running tension
along the border with the North, the official said, speaking on customary
condition of anonymity.
"He couldn't leave his post vacant during the period, because North Korea may
provoke at any time soon," the Air Force official said.
Pyongyang has notified international agencies it will launch a communications
satellite between April 4-8, a move neighboring nations suspect is a disguise for
a long-range missile test.
North Korea recently warned it cannot guarantee the safety of South Korean
passenger planes flying over its eastern waters during a joint South Korea-U.S.
military exercise, which ended on Friday. It also threatened an armed conflict
near the Yellow Sea border with South Korea, arguing it should be drawn further
south. Naval battles turned bloody twice there over the past decade.
Lee had planned to push for deals with Turkey and Oman to export South Korea's
T-50 Golden Eagles, South Korea's first indigenous supersonic training aircraft,
the official said.