Talks resume between North, South Korea
PYONGYANG, North Korea – Marathon negotiations by senior officials from the Koreas stretched into a third day today as the rivals tried to pull back from the brink. South Korea’s military, meanwhile, said North Korea continued to prepare for a fight, moving unusual numbers of troops, hovercraft and submarines to the border.
Officials described a “tense” mood but refused to provide details of the talks, which started Saturday and whose second session began Sunday and was still going late this morning. For the time being, the diplomacy pushed aside previous heated warnings of imminent war.
At issue is a South Korean demand that the North apologize for what Seoul said was a land mine attack that maimed two South Korean soldiers and was followed by an artillery barrage last week. North Korea denies both attacks and demands Seoul stop anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts started in retaliation for the explosions. South Korea’s president says broadcasts will continue unless the North apologizes.
These are the highest-level talks between the two Koreas in a year. And just the fact senior officials from countries that have spent recent days vowing to destroy each other are sitting together at a table in Panmunjom is something of a victory.
The length of the talks – nearly 10 hours for the first session and more than 18 for the second – and the lack of immediate progress are not unusual. While the Koreas often have difficulty agreeing to talks, once they do, overlong sessions are often the rule.
The decision to hold talks came hours ahead of a Saturday deadline set by North Korea for the South to dismantle the propaganda loudspeakers. North Korea had declared that its front-line troops were in full war readiness and prepared to go to battle if Seoul did not back down.
South Korea said even as the North was pursuing dialogue, its troops were preparing for a fight.
An official from Seoul’s Defense Ministry said that about 70 percent of the North’s more than 70 submarines and undersea vehicles had left their bases and were undetectable by the South Korean military as of Saturday. The official, who refused to be named because of official rules, also said the North had doubled the strength of its front-line artillery forces since the start of the talks Saturday evening.
South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, citing unidentified military sources, said today that North Korea had forward deployed about 10 hovercraft used for landings by special operation forces in the event of a war about 37 miles north of the Koreas’ disputed western sea boundary. South Korea’s Defense Ministry couldn’t immediately confirm the report.
The standoff started with the explosions of land mines on the southern side of the Demilitarized Zone between the Koreas that Seoul says were planted by North Korea. In response, the South resumed anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts for the first time in 11 years, infuriating the North, which is extremely sensitive to any criticism of its authoritarian system. Analysts say the North fears the broadcasts could demoralize its front-line troops and inspire them to defect.
While the meeting offered a way for the rivals to avoid an immediate collision, analysts in Seoul wondered whether the countries were standing too far apart to expect a quick agreement.