Seoul responsible for tensions on Korea Peninsula-N Korea official.

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21/5 Tass 13 1

PYONGYANG, May 21 (Itar-Tass) - The published in Seoul results of "the
provocative investigation of the circumstances of the death of a ship of
the South Korean puppet Navy have become another manifestation of the plot
against North Korea made by the South together with the United States and
Japan," an official of the North Korean Committee for the Peaceful
Unification of Korea said in a statement on Friday, according to the North'
s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
According to the statement, the group headed by South Korean President
Lee Myung-Bak, seeking the escalation of tension in relations with the
compatriots and toughening of sanctions has arrived at the conclusion that
the "ship was sunk by North Korea."
The Yonhap news agency of South Korea reported that North Korea warned
Friday it will scrap a non-aggression pact with South Korea and freeze all
inter-Korean relations if Seoul tries to punish it for the sinking of a
warship in March.
Accusing South Korea of creating a situation where a war "may break
out right now," the North said it will react with "merciless punishment"
to any countermeasures by Seoul.
The statement came a day after a team of multinational investigators
announced in Seoul that North Korea sank the South Korean warship, the
Cheonan, in a torpedo attack on March 26.
North Korea's highest seat of power, the National Defence Commission,
immediately rejected the accusation as a fabrication. A statement Friday
by the North's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea,
monitored in Seoul, called it a "ridiculous charade."
The Cheonan, a 1,200-ton patrol ship, sank after breaking in two in
waters near the inter-Korean border in the Yellow Sea. Forty-six young
sailors were killed in the disaster. Investigators said a North Korean
submarine had infiltrated South Korean waters and attacked the ship with a
torpedo, citing as evidence retrieved parts of the weapon that bore
markings of North Korean letters and design.
"Firstly, from now on the DPRK (North Korea) will regard the present
situation as the phase of a war and decisively handle all matters arising
in the inter-Korean relations to cope with it," the statement, carried by
KCNA, said. If South Korea moves to retaliate, North Korea will "strongly
react to them with such merciless punishment as the total freeze of the
inter-Korean relations, the complete abrogation of the north-south
agreement on non-aggression and a total halt to the inter-Korean
cooperation undertakings," it said.
According to KCNA, a spokesman for the DPRK National Defence
Commission issued a statement today as regards the sinking of warship
"Cheonan" of the south Korean puppet navy.
The statement reads: "We had already warned the South Korean group of
traitors not to make reckless remarks concerning the sinking of warship
"Cheonan" of the puppet navy. Nevertheless, the group of traitors had
far-fetchedly tried to link the case with us without offering any material
evidence. It finally announced the results of the joint investigation
based on a sheer fabrication, which assert that the warship was sunken by
our torpedo attack, in a bid to mislead the public opinion inside and
outside Korea."
"It is, at the same time, crying out for "punishment" and
"retaliation" internally and foolishly seeking to prod the international
community into applying additional "sanctions" against the DPRK. What
matters is that traitor Lee Myung-Bak is taking the lead in such anti-DPRK
smear campaign, even daring slander the headquarters of our revolution,"
it says.
"Meanwhile, Kim Thae Yong and other gangsters of the south Korean
puppet military accustomed to flattery and blind obedience echo Lee
Myung-Bak's outbursts. This smear campaign is fanned up by Ryu Myung Hwan
and other ultra-rightist conservatives of south Korea," the statement says.
"This is also joined by the US and Japanese aggressors who are making
desperate efforts to keep their hostile policy towards the DPRK on its
orbit. We would like to question them so busy linking the above-said case
with the DPRK why they don't link with it the death of a puppet army
soldier, crashes of fighter plane and gunship of the puppet navy and air
force and the sinking of a civilian fishing boat that occurred one after
another almost simultaneously," it says.
"It is the age of science and technology. As a swollen balloon is
bound to break, any lie is bound to be brought to light no matter how hard
one may try to make it sound plausible. What is evident is that the
sinking of warship "Cheonan" can never be construed otherwise than a
"conspiratorial farce" and "charade" orchestrated by the group of traitors
in a deliberate and brigandish manner to achieve certain political and
military aims because only 46 soldiers met miserable deaths while officers
survived the case," it says.
"This being a hard reality, they are pointing a dirty accusing finger
at us like a thief crying "Stop the thief!" It is a trite method of the
successive south Korean puppet regimes to fake up a shocking case and use
it for floating a story about "north wind" whenever they find themselves
in a crisis," the statement says, in particular.
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