South Korean personnel began withdrawing from North Korea's Mount Kumgang resort after Pyongyang asked them to leave, officials said yesterday.
The withdrawal followed a North Korean statement on Saturday that “unnecessary” South Korean personnel would be expelled from the mountain resort just north of the border.
South Korea expressed regret saying the North’s move would further escalate tensions over the July 11 fatal shooting of a housewife who the North said strayed into a restricted military area at the resort.
The South said 11 personnel including two from the state-run Korea Tourism Organization and nine in charge of a newly built facility for reunions of separated families in the resort had been asked to leave by early today.
“One left on Saturday and another two are supposed to leave today,” said a spokesman for the South Korea’s unification ministry, which is in charge of cross-border relations.
“More people will leave the resort by Thursday,” he said.
The withdrawal will bring the number of South Koreans staying in the area to about 120, the ministry said.
There have been no government officials staying in the area since the South suspended tourist trips to Kumgang in protest at the shooting.
The North blames the South for the incident and has rejected Seoul’s call for a joint on-site probe.
The North’s military said in its statement on Saturday that the movement of South Koreans and their vehicles passing through the inter-Korean border in Kumgang would be strictly limited and controlled.
It accused South Korea of pushing inter-Korean relations to “a graver phase,” referring to a joint statement issued last week by US President George W. Bush and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak after their summit in Seoul.
The two leaders expressed regret at the shooting and urged the North to engage in talks to resolve the case swiftly.
Tensions have been mounting since the shooting death of Park Wang-ja, who was killed by one or more soldiers during a dawn stroll on a beach.
The North said she fled when challenged and did not stop despite warning shots.
The two countries have remained technically at war since their 1950 to 1953 conflict ended only in an armistice and not a peace treaty.
They held a series of rapprochement events including the opening of cross-border railways after a historic inter-Korean summit in 2000.
But inter-Korean relations have been at their lowest ebb since Lee came to power in February and suspended aid to the North.
When a hiker fell from a 55m waterfall in wild New Zealand bush, rescuers were forced to evacuate the badly hurt woman without her dog, which could not be found. After strangers raised thousands of dollars for a search, border collie Molly was flown to safety by a helicopter pilot who was determined to reunite the pet and the owner. A week earlier, an emergency rescue helicopter found the woman with bruises and lacerations after a fall at a rocky spot at the waterfall on the South Island’s West Coast. She was airlifted on March 24, but they were forced to
CONFIDENCE BOOSTER: ’After parkour ... you dare to do a lot of things that you think only young people can do,’ a 67-year-old parkour enthusiast said In a corner of suburban Singapore, Betty Boon vaults a guardrail, crawls underneath a slide, executes forward shoulder rolls and scales a steep slope, finishing the course to applause. “Good job,” the 69-year-old’s coach cheers. This is “geriatric parkour,” where about 20 retirees learned to tackle a series of relatively demanding exercises, building their agility and enjoying a sense of camaraderie. Boon, an upbeat grandmother, said learning parkour has aided her confidence and independence as she ages. “When you’re weak, you will be dependent on someone,” she said after sweating it out with her parkour classmates in suburban Toa Payoh,
Chinese dissident artist Gao Zhen (高兟), famous for making provocative satirical sculptures of former Chinese leader Mao Zedong (毛澤東), was tried on Monday over accusations of “defaming national heroes and martyrs,” his wife and a rights group said. Gao, 69, who was detained in 2024 during a visit from the US, faces a maximum three-year prison sentence, said his wife, Zhao Yaliang (趙雅良), and Shane Yi, a researcher at the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group which operates outside the nation. The closed-door, one-day trial took place at Sanhe City People’s Court in Hebei Province neighboring the capital, Beijing, and ended without a
‘TOXIC CLIMATE’: ‘I don’t really recognize Labour anymore... The idea that you can implement far-right ideas in order to stop the far right is nonsense,’ a protester said Tens of thousands of people on Saturday marched through central London to protest against the far right, weeks ahead of local elections and six months after Britain saw one of its largest far-right demonstrations. Organized by hundreds of civic groups, including trade unions, anti-racism campaigners and Muslim representative bodies, Saturday’s Together Alliance event was billed as the biggest in UK history to counter right-wing extremism. A separate pro-Palestinian march had also converged with the main rally. While organizers claimed 500,000 had turned out in total, the police gave a figure of about 50,000. Protesters carrying placards with slogans such as
RSS