YONHAP NEWS

(LEAD) (News Focus) N. Korea revives Cold War tensions with border threats

   By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, Jan. 30 (Yonhap) -- With threats to scrap a fundamental accord safeguarding against inter-Korean military clashes, North Korea revived Cold War era tensions on Friday, sending an ultimatum to Seoul's government: Withdraw your hard-line policy or face a possible clash.

   The warning comes as the new U.S. administration is reviewing policy on North Korea, a timing that appeared to be also an attempt to draw Washington's attention to stalled nuclear negotiations, analysts said.

   Whether Pyongyang will immediately try a military provocation is uncertain, but analysts cautioned Seoul to be on full alert along a volatile inter-Korean sea border where bloody skirmishes occurred in 1999 and 2002.

   Tension has considerably risen on the peninsula since conservative President Lee Myung-bak took office 11 months ago. His recent nomination of a hawkish scholar as the new unification minister has further enraged North Korea.

   "It's a many-sided strategy," Yoo Ho-yeol, a North Korea studies professor at Korea University, said.

   "The North wants the U.S. to realize the seriousness of the situation on the Korean Peninsula," he said. "Internally, it wants to solidify unity by raising tension with South Korea. Toward the Lee Myung-bak government, it is applying tremendous pressure to force it to back down."

   In its most acerbic warning in nearly two decades, North Korea said on Friday it is scrapping the landmark Basic Agreement and declared the western sea border void.

   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.

   Known as the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the western sea border was unilaterally drawn by the U.S.-led United Nations Command at the end of the 1950-53 war. North Korea has insisted the sea border be re-drawn further south. Military skirmishes occurred there in 1999 and 2002, leaving scores of soldiers killed or wounded on both sides.

   "The origin of the NLL is deeply interlinked with the United States," Kim Young-soo, a political professor at Sogang University said, noting the U.S. military fought with South Korea during the war.

   "North Korea has been expecting the Obama administration to roll out an engagement policy, but the U.S. has made clear that its principles on the North's nuclear program are strict. 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 catastrophe,'" he said.

   Pyongyang sees Obama's inauguration as an opportunity to start anew with Washington after eight combative years with George W. Bush. Obama said he will work "with old allies and former foes" to lessen the nuclear threat, but also suggested he will not compromise in verifying Pyongyang's nuclear program.

   Six-party talks, also grouping South Korea, China, Japan and Russia, are on hold due to the dispute over how to verify North Korea's past nuclear activities.

   Paik Hak-soon, a senior research fellow with the Sejong Institute, an independent think tank, said Pyongyang is sending an ultimatum to the Lee government and a message for dialogue to Washington, he said.

   "It is also a message to U.S. President Barack Obama, saying, 'Inter-Korean relations have been good in the past, but the Lee government is worsening the situation. Do not involve South Korea in negotiations with the North,'" he said.

   Seoul officials made clear there will be no shift in their current hard-line stance. A month before his first anniversary in office, President Lee replaced a moderate official with a hard-liner as unification minister, in a sign that his tough policy on Pyongyang will get even tougher regardless of the deep freeze in inter-Korean relations.
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, and has openly prioritized Seoul-Washington alliance over inter-Korean ties.

   Abiding by that policy, Lee suspended South Korea's customary rice and fertilizer aid to the North.

   In Friday's statement, issued by the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea, a governmental body handling inter-Korean affairs, North Korea said, "Inter-Korean relations have reached such pass that there is neither a way to improve them nor hope to bring them on track."

   The South Korean government expressed "deep regret" and reiterated its position urging North Korea to "accept our call for dialogue as soon as possible."

   To draw Seoul's compromise, North Korea is raising tensions as high as it can, Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea professor at Dongguk University, said.

   "The North is sensing that South Korea's government is becoming more conservative," he said, "North Korea is saying that it won't just sit and watch."

   Saber-rattling toward South Korea may also be a tactic to quiet internal jitters amid deepening economic woes, analysts said. North Korea launched a post-war reconstruction campaign this year to "solve food problems by our own efforts," but its prospects remain dim amid a global economic downturn and falling foreign aid.

   Economic woes forced Pyongyang late last year to put off its decision to stem the growing capitalist trend in markets.

   North Korea is awaiting important events in the coming weeks -- leader Kim Jong-il's birthday on Feb. 16, an event that usually rekindles military loyalty to him, and parliamentary elections on March 8.

   "As was shown in the decision to put off market control, there seems to be an internal conflict in pushing policies, and by raising tension with the South, the North is seeking to solidify its internal unity," said Choi Jin-wook, an analyst with the Korea Institute for National Unification, a state-run think tank.

   hkim@yna.co.kr
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