Inter-Korean exchanges decline sharply in 2009: report

SEOUL, Dec. 18 (Yonhap) -- Cross-border exchanges between the two Koreas
decreased by some 38 percent this year as North Korea ratcheted up tension with a
long-range missile launch and second nuclear test, Seoul's Unification Ministry
said Friday.
The number of people crossing the border between the two Koreas fell to 109,271
as of November this year from 174,984 during the same period in 2008, according
to the ministry's report.
Inter-Korean trade volume also shrank by nearly 14 percent to US$1.46 billion in
the January-November period from $1.69 billion a year ago, the report added.
"We believe the decrease is largely due to North Korea's cross-border traffic
restrictions enforced from December last year to August and the (South Korean)
government's control of cross-border trips following the North's nuclear and
missile tests," the ministry said in a press release. "The overall economic
downturn also played a role in the trade decrease."
North Korea, protesting Seoul's tougher stance toward it since the launch of the
Lee Myung-bak administration, imposed restrictions on border crossings by South
Koreans on Dec. 1 last year.
The move further eroded the atmosphere of reconciliation that followed the first
inter-Korean summit in 2000. The traffic restrictions, which caused heavy losses
for South Korean companies operating in a joint-industrial complex in the North's
border town of Kaesong, were lifted eight months later.
The communist North also launched a long-range missile in April and conducted its
second atomic bomb test in May, shunning multilateral denuclearization talks with
South Korea, the United States, China, Japan and Russia.
The two Koreas are still technically at war as the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a
cease-fire and not a peace treaty.
hayney@yna.co.kr
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