hankyoreh

Oct. 4.

By Kim Kyu-won, staff reporter 　

North Korea issued scathing criticism of South Korean President Park Geun-hye for the third day in a row, saying, “The Yushin dictatorship is being resurrected.”

The criticism is presumed to be Pyongyang’s reaction to the Park administration’s passive attitude toward expanding inter-Korean cooperative efforts such as tourism at Mt. Keumgang and to the negative stance the US has taken to improving relations with North Korea.

While North Korea’s eager demands brought inter-Korean relations into a phase of dialogue for a short time this past summer, it is expected that relations between North and South will be chilly for some time to come.

North Korea’s state-run newspaper the Rodong Shinmun ran a story on Oct. 6 titled “The Specter of the Yushin Dictatorship Returns.”

The article was harshly critical of Park, referring to her administration as “the descendants of the Yushin dictatorship” and to Park herself as “the current power holder of the puppet regime.”

“Park openly praises the evils of the past period of military dictatorship, and she is viciously scheming to turn back the clock on the historical trend of developments in democracy and justice.”

The paper said that the indictment of Unified Progressive Party lawmaker Lee Seok-ki on charges of plotting an insurrection was “a continuation of the scheme to restore the Yushin dictatorship.”

It also referred to the allegations that the National Intelligence Service (NIS) interfered in last year’s presidential election, claiming that the NIS’s actions “annihilated democracy and gave a reprieve to a fascist, dictatorial regime.”

“The Park administration denies the ultimate dignity and regime of her counterparts and slanders them with all kinds of nasty stories as it instigates and aggravates a confrontation,” said a spokesperson for the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland (CPRF), North Korea’s body that handles relations with the South, in a statement released on Oct. 5.

“Even now, Park and her followers must take heed of our just criticism and our fair warning and correct their behavior,” the statement said.

On Oct. 4, North Korea released a critical statement under the name of the spokesperson of the policy bureau of the National Defense Commission, the highest executive body in the North.

“Under the pretext of bringing about change in North Korea, Park and her followers have colluded with a foreign power in a rash and ill-advised effort to overthrow the North Korean system and to dismantle our nuclear weapons,” the statement said.

Experts believe that North Korea intended the criticism to send a signal that relations with the South will be cooling for the time being.

“North Korea had been trying in its own way to improve relations with the South, but the Park administration insisted on bringing North Korea to heel, viewing inter-Korean relations from the perspective of domestic politics,” said Inje University professor Kim Yeon-cheol.

“If the Park administration wants to improve inter-Korean relations now, it will have to indicate its intention to reopen tours to Mt. Keumgang or to hold high-level talks,” Kim said.

“North Korea is calling on Park to change the way she views it,” said Yang Moo-jin, professor at the University of North Korean Studies.

“China has done all that it can, and the US is putting a higher priority on the situations in Syria and Iran,” Yang said. “Because of this, it does not seem likely that inter-Korean relations will improve for the time beginning unless the attitude of the South Korean government changes.”

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