Lee urges N. Korea to change for peace
Source: Agencies |
August 16, 2010, Monday
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SOUTH Korea's president urged North Korea to abandon military provocations and make a "courageous change" toward peace, using a speech yesterday marking the Korean peninsula's liberation from Japanese rule to outline a path for its eventual reunification.
President Lee Myung-bak made the offer as relations between the two Koreas are at their lowest following the March sinking of a South Korean warship that an international probe blamed on North Korea. Forty-six sailors were killed. Pyongyang denies attacking the ship.
"The North must never venture to carry out another provocation, nor will we tolerate it if they do so again," Lee said in a televised speech.
Lee - marking the 65th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japanese rule at the end of World War II in 1945 - called the ship's sinking an "unprovoked attack" by North Korea and demanded Pyongyang heed calls to improve ties with Seoul.
He also said South Korea should prepare for unification with North Korea by studying measures including the adoption of a unification tax aimed at raising money for the costs of integration.
Lee said North Korea must face reality and make a "courageous change." He proposed a three-stage unification process in which they would first form a "peace community" involving denuclearization of the peninsula, then an "economic community" for cross-border economic integration, and a "community of the Korean nation."
President Lee Myung-bak made the offer as relations between the two Koreas are at their lowest following the March sinking of a South Korean warship that an international probe blamed on North Korea. Forty-six sailors were killed. Pyongyang denies attacking the ship.
"The North must never venture to carry out another provocation, nor will we tolerate it if they do so again," Lee said in a televised speech.
Lee - marking the 65th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japanese rule at the end of World War II in 1945 - called the ship's sinking an "unprovoked attack" by North Korea and demanded Pyongyang heed calls to improve ties with Seoul.
He also said South Korea should prepare for unification with North Korea by studying measures including the adoption of a unification tax aimed at raising money for the costs of integration.
Lee said North Korea must face reality and make a "courageous change." He proposed a three-stage unification process in which they would first form a "peace community" involving denuclearization of the peninsula, then an "economic community" for cross-border economic integration, and a "community of the Korean nation."
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