SEOUL, March 9: Some 80 South Koreans were stranded in North Korea on Monday and hundreds more cancelled trips the other way after Pyongyang effectively shut its border with Seoul, officials said.

The North said it was switching off military phone and fax lines, which are used to approve border crossings, in protest at a joint US-South Korean military exercise which started on Monday.

It ordered its 1.2-million-member military to be fully combat-ready, saying the exercise was aimed at launching a “second Korean War”.

“As an immediate measure we will enforce a more strict military control and cut off the north-south military communications” during the March 9-20 drill, an army spokesman for the North said.

“It is nonsensical to maintain a normal communications channel at a time when the South Korean puppets are getting frantic with the above-said war exercises, levelling guns at fellow countrymen in league with foreign forces.” Seoul’s unification ministry said 726 people were unable to travel to the Kaesong joint industrial complex, built just north of the border as a symbol of reconciliation. Eighty others due to return home from Kaesong were blocked from returning.

“Our government regrets” the border measure, said ministry spokesman Kim Ho-Nyoun, urging the North to respect inter-Korean accords and stop raising tensions.

“Our government urges North Korea to immediately retract its measure and guarantee smooth passage and communications,” Kim said.

Kim denied the 80 are being detained, saying the North’s officials are awaiting orders on immigration matters from higher authorities. “It is necessary for us to wait and see the North’s attitude.” Truck traffic was also halted to the Seoul-financed Kaesong estate which opened in 2005.

The South Korean firms at the estate truck raw materials northwards over the border, with finished products going the other way for sale in South Korea or overseas.

“We cannot bring personnel and raw material in and out of Kaesong at the moment. We cannot bring back products already made in Kaesong either,” Yoo Chang-Geun, vice chairman of a group of estate factory owners.

“If this situation continues for a prolonged period, businesses will be in serious trouble.” Companies have already been hit by growing costs, the global economic downturn and difficulties caused by inter-Korean tensions. The North has also been tightening regulations in recent weeks.

Kaesong was seen as a landmark project, with the North providing cheap but skilled labour and Seoul supplying the investment and know-how.

At the end of February about 39,000 North Koreans worked at 98 South Korean firms, producing items such as watches, clothes, shoes and kitchenware.—AFP
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