North Korea Warns It May Close Shared Factory With South
By CHOE SANG-HUN and GERRY MULLANY
North Korea threatened to shut a complex that is a source of badly
needed cash, while some government-run Web sites were disabled in what
news media reports called cyberattacks.
By CHOE SANG-HUN and GERRY MULLANY
Published: March 30, 2013
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea, reiterating that it considered the Korean Peninsula back in “a state of war,” threatened Saturday to shut down a factory complex it jointly operates with South Korea and that stands as the last significant symbol of cooperation.Multimedia
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The industrial park, the eight-year-old Kaesong complex in the North
Korean border town of the same name, is a crucial source of badly needed
cash for the heavily sanctioned North. It funnels more than $92 million
a year in wages for 53,400 North Koreans employed there, and its
operation has survived despite years of military tensions. The latest
threat to close down Kaesong came amid a torrent of bellicose statements
by the North in recent days, widely seen as a strategy to increase
pressure on South Korea and the United States to soften their policies
on the North.
Although South Korean officials reasserted that they were ready to
retaliate if the North committed any military provocations, they said
they saw no imminent sign of any such attacks. On Saturday, cross-border
traffic operated as normal, allowing hundreds of South Koreans to
travel to and from Kaesong.
Over 300 South Koreans remained in the complex, where 123 South Korean
textile and other labor-intensive factories employ the North Korean
workers, at an average monthly wage of $144.
The fate of Kaesong is seen as a crucial test of how far North Korea is
willing to take its recent threats against the South. Its continued
operation was often seen as a sign that Pyongyang’s verbal militancy was
not necessarily matched by its actions.
“The South Korean puppet forces are left with no face to make complaint
even though we ban the South side’s personnel’s entry into the zone and
close it,” North Korea said Saturday in a statement carried by its
official Korean Central News Agency. It said its dignity was insulted by
South Korean news media reports that suggested the North kept the
complex open to obtain hard currency.
In another development, some of the North’s main government-run Web
sites were disabled on Saturday in what news media reports said were
cyberattacks.
The disabled sites included those of Naenara, the government’s official
Web portal; Air Koryo, the state-run airline; and Voice of Korea,
Pyongyang’s international broadcast outlet.
North Korea Tech, a Web site that monitors Internet activities on the
Korean Peninsula, said the problems appeared “to be part of a loosely
coordinated effort by hackers to target North Korean sites.” By late
Saturday afternoon, North Korean officials had not confirmed any attacks
on government-run Web sites.
The problems come as some analysts suspect that cyberattacks have become
an increasingly frequent weapon in the intensified sparring between the
Koreas, although each side denies hacking the other.
South Korean officials suspect that North Korea was behind cyberattacks
on March 20 against three banks and the country’s two largest
broadcasters. The attacks came five days after North Korea blamed the
South and the United States for cyberattacks that temporarily shut down
some of its official Web sites, and warned of “consequences.”
North Korea has been angry ever since South Korea and the United States
started a joint military exercise in early March. Its bellicosity
further escalated when the United Nations imposed more sanctions against
it after its Feb. 12 nuclear test.
The North has since declared an “all-out action” against Washington and
Seoul and said that the armistice that stopped the Korean War in 1953,
as well as all nonaggression agreements with the South, was nullified.
Last week, it cut the last remaining military hot lines with Seoul. Its
leader, Kim Jong-un, ordered all his missile units to be on standby and
if provoked, attack the United States and South Korea with
nuclear-tipped long-range missiles, although most analysts doubt the
North has them.
A statement by South Korea’s military said that although the North
Korean threats were not new, they “are unacceptable and harm the peace
and stability of the Korean Peninsula.”
A version of this article appeared in print on March 31, 2013, on page A4 of the New York edition with the headline: North Korea Threatens to Close Factories It Runs With South.
Timeline on North Korea’s Nuclear Program
The country’s nuclear weapons program and its development of long-range
rocket systems have angered many in the West, including in the United
States.
Estimated Range of North Korean Missiles
Missiles currently in North Korean arsenal.
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