S. Korea to complete pullout from N. Korea

By Shim Sun-ah
SEOUL, Dec. 4 (Yonhap) -- South Korea will complete the withdrawal of hundreds of
its nationals from North Korea Thursday after the communist nation ordered them
out.
The North earlier demanded that, starting this week, the number of South Koreans
working at the joint industrial and tourism zones in Kaesong and Mount Kumgang be
halved to 880 and 100, respectively. The communist nation said the cutback is
part of its initial retaliatory measures on Seoul's hard-line policy toward
Pyongyang.
The last group of about 50 staffers, including 23 Chinese, are scheduled to leave
the two North Korean areas in the afternoon, according to Kim Ho-nyoun, spokesman
for Seoul's Unification Ministry dealing with North Korea.
They originally planned to cross the heavily armed border into the South a day
ago but their departure has been delayed due to procedural matters.
North Korea fell short of taking any measure that directly affects the Kaesong
industrial complex where 88 South Korean labor-intensive manufacturers operate
with more than 36,000 North Koreans employed. Seoul officials and companies in
Kaesong, however, worry the sharp reduction of South Korean officials and
managers there and stricter restriction of traffic across the border would
seriously cripple the companies' operations.
Inter-Korean relations have worsened since the conservative South Korean
President Lee Myung-bak took office in February and took a firmer stance on North
Korea, which refuses to give up its nuclear weapons program. There have been no
reconciliation talks between the two Koreas for the past 10 months while
emotional tension has risen.
North Korea is especially angry at Seoul's reluctance to carry out a spate of
cross-border economic projects that were agreed on between leaders of the two
sides in 2000 and 2007. Those projects would require massive South Korean
investment in the impoverished communist state.
sshim@yna.co.kr
(END)