S. Korea calls on N. Korea to stop raising tension with border accusation

By Sam Kim
SEOUL, April 22 (Yonhap) -- North Korea is "unnecessarily raising tension" by
making false claims that South Korea tried to push their heavily armed border
further north, a South Korean defense official said Wednesday.
North Korea said earlier in the day that South Korea moved a border marker dozens
of meters to the north in the Demilitarized Zone. The accusation came after the
first official talks in more than a year between the divided states ended without
progress.
"We call on North Korea to stop unnecessarily raising tension by making
groundless claims," Army Col. Park Sung-woo, spokesman for the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, said in a briefing
"The border marker in question is managed by North Korea," he said. "We did not
approach it. Therefore, we did not move it."
About 1,290 markers are used to draw the border that cuts across the Korean
Peninsula, Park said.
South and North Korea remain in a technical state of war after the 1950-53 Korean
War ended in a truce rather than a peace treaty. They have deployed a major
portion of their respective forces along the military demarcation line.
samkim@yna.co.kr
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