NORTH KOREA-SOUTH KOREA/KAESONG South Korea limits entry into joint industrial park

Record ID: 143156

  • Title: NORTH KOREA-SOUTH KOREA/KAESONG South Korea limits entry into joint industrial park
  • Date: 21st August 2015
  • Summary: SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA (AUGUST 21, 2015) (REUTERS) SOUTH KOREAN UNIFICATION MINISTRY SPOKESMAN JEONG JOON-HEE WALKING IN AND STANDING IN FRONT OF PODIUM JOURNALISTS AT NEWS BRIEFING NEWS BRIEFING IN PROGRESS (SOUNDBITE) (Korean) SOUTH KOREAN UNIFICATION MINISTRY SPOKESMAN JEONG JOON-HEE SAYING: "It's now a very grave situation. So, we need to operate Kaesong Industrial Complex
  • Embargoed: 5th September 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA5X8GS2K8JHPTYMUYAGAVXRCNF
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: South Korean Unification Ministry on Friday (August 21) limited entry into the Kaesong industrial park which runs jointly with North Korea, after two Koreas exchanged fire.
    "It's now a very grave situation. So we need to operate Kaesong Industrial Complex with necessary but minimum personnel," said Jeong Joon-hee, a spokesman for the South's Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs.
    However, the complex, seen as a barometer for the state of inter-Korean relations, continued to operate.
    "Nevertheless, there should be no trouble in company operation, so we are working on with the companies to overcome this serious situation," Jeong added.
    The Kaesong Industrial Complex, a few kilometres north of the inter-Korean border, is the last significant vestige of cooperation spawned by the neighbours' first summit meeting 15 years ago. North Korea shut down the complex for five months in 2013, during a period of diplomatic tension that followed a nuclear test by Pyongyang.
    Tension on the divided Korean peninsula escalated on Thursday (August 20) when North Korea fired shells into South Korea to protest against the loudspeaker broadcasts from near the Korean border. The South responded with its own artillery barrage.
    Both sides said there were no casualties or damage in their territory.
    North Korea warned Seoul in a letter that it would take military action if the South did not stop the broadcasts along the border within 48 hours, North Korea's state media KRT said.
    The North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would put his troops on a "fully armed state of war" starting from 5 p.m. (0830 GMT) and had declared a "quasi-state of war" in frontline areas, KRT added.
    Seoul began blasting anti-North Korean propaganda from loudspeakers on the border on August 10, resuming a tactic that both sides had stopped in 2004.
    The two Koreas have remained in a technical state of war since the 1950-1953 Korean War ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.
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