S. Koreans begin to exit N. Korea as it cuts joint projects

SEOUL, Nov. 28 (Yonhap) -- Hundreds of South Koreans working at joint facilities in North Korea packed up and left on Friday after Pyongyang ordered them out to protest Seoul's hardline policy toward the communist state, officials said.

The massive pullout is symptomatic of the recently estranged relations between
the two Koreas, which turned sour after South Korea's conservative President Lee
Myung-bak took office in February and took a firmer stance toward Pyongyang than
his two liberal predecessors.
Pyongyang has so far blamed Lee for heightening tensions by refusing to implement
a slew of cross-border economic projects that were agreed upon in historic
summits of 2000 and 2007 and to change his "confrontational" stance toward
Pyongyang. Those projects would require massive South Korean investment in the
impoverished communist state.
North Korea is especially upset at the spreading of anti-Pyongyang leaflets by
South Korean activist groups and South Korea's large-scale war exercises with the
U.S. military and participation as a co-sponsor of the U.N. resolution denouncing
Pyongyang's human rights situation last month.
Nearly 900 South Koreans, including nine from at the first and only inter-Korean
joint economic office, crossed the heavily armed border into the South on Friday
afternoon, officials said.
They will be followed up a second group composed of more than 1,000 people on
Saturday, according to Kim Ho-nyoun, spokesman for the Seoul's Unification
Ministry in charge of North Korea affairs. He refused to give an exact figure,
saying negotiations are under way between the two Koreas over how many will stay.
"Of 4,168 people with (North Korea-issued) visas to stay in the Kaesong
industrial complex, around 1,500 to 1,700 have already gotten permission from the
North to stay after Dec. 1," Kim said in a press briefing. "But the number of
those allowed to stay may increase since negotiations are still under way," he
added.
North Korea announced on Monday it would, starting Dec. 1, halt the cross-border
train service, suspend South Korean tours to the ancient city of Kaesong in its
first retaliatory action against Seoul's policy.
The North also ordered to halve the number of South Koreans working at the
Kaesong complex there but stopped short of taking any action against 88 South
Korean plants there.
Earlier on Friday, a South Korean train made its last round-trip across the
border into North Korea before the cut-off date. A convoy of buses carrying 210
South Koreans left for Kaesong in what would also be the final such tour for the
foreseeable future.
The start of the regular freight train service almost a year ago was hailed as a
milestone in reconciliation efforts. But the trains have run nearly empty, as
most of Kaesong's firms prefer using trucks rather than trains whose North Korean
station is distant from the industrial complex.
"I am so sad that the cross-border train service will be suspended again," said
Shin Jang-chul, the train's conductor.
On Dec. 11 last year, Shin drove the first train to cross the border in 56 years
on a reconnected railway. "I was happy then that the two Koreas would have a
regular train service beyond a trial run in May."
Shin expressed hopes that the railway operation would resume soon, while analysts
said it may take quite some time to put it back on track as long as South Korea's
Lee administration maintains its stiff approach.
More than 110,000 people have taken the sightseeing tour to Kaesong since its
launch in December last year. South Korean-run tours to the North's scenic
mountain of Geumgang were suspended in July after tourist was shot dead there by
a North Korean soldier.
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