Kim: Nuclear weapons secured agreement
Print Edition
NORTH Korean leader Kim Jong-Un said nuclear weapons — not negotiating skills — secured this week’s “landmark” agreement with South Korea, as he dismissed a number of officials from a top military decision-making body.
Chairing a meeting of the powerful Central Military Commission, Kim credited North Korea with striking the deal that ended a tense military standoff with South Korea, the official KCNA news agency said yesterday.
The agreement, reached after marathon day-night talks in the border truce village of Panmunjom, pulled both sides back from the brink of an armed conflict and committed them to starting an official dialogue.
But Kim made it clear that sitting down to talks would not entail North Korea discussing the end of its nuclear weapons program, which he said was key to maintaining peace in the first place.
The Panmunjom agreement “was by no means something achieved on the negotiating table but thanks to the tremendous military muscle with the nuclear deterrent for self-defence,” Kim told the meeting.
The meeting “dismissed some members of the CMC and appointed new ones and dealt with an organizational matter,” the KCNA said, without elaborating on the reason for the dismissals.
Since taking power in North Korea following the death of his father Kim Jong-Il in December 2011, Kim Jong-Un has repeatedly reshuffled his senior military leaders.
The latest inter-Korean crisis had its roots in landmine blasts earlier this month that maimed two South Korean soldiers on patrol along the border with North Korea.
Seoul blamed Pyongyang and responded by switching on banks of giant speakers, which had lain silent for more than a decade, and blasting propaganda messages into North Korea.
North Korea denied any involvement and threatened to attack the propaganda units as cross-border tensions soared.
The agreement reached in Panmunjom saw North Korea express regret — but not admit responsibility — for the maiming of the two soldiers, while South Korea ended the broadcasts.
The talks were initiated by North Korea — a fact that some analysts took as a sign that Pyongyang had blinked first in an escalating showdown that included a rare artillery exchange across the land border.
In his speech to the CMC, Kim acknowledged and embraced the fact Pyongyang had sought the negotiations as evidence of its moral and strategic strength.
North Korea’s initiative, “put under control the situation which inched close to an armed conflict, thereby clearing the dark clouds of war,” he said.
He underscored the need to channel “top priority efforts” into strengthening North Korea’s military capability.
While playing up Pyongyang’s role, Kim stressed that the agreement was a “crucial landmark occasion” that offered both Koreas a chance to move forward to better ties.
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