N. Korea tightens ban on S. Korean mobile phones, GPS receivers

SEOUL, Jan. 7 (Yonhap) -- North Korea has tightened monitoring of the use of
mobile phones and car GPS receivers by South Koreans in a joint industrial
complex in its border town, Seoul officials said Wednesday.
South Korean electronic gadgets are prohibited in North Korea by inter-Korean
rules, but the country had tacitly allowed South Korean businessmen to cross the
border if they turned off their GPS receivers and entrusted their phones to the
customs office.
Since December, however, the North has been flatly turning away people carrying
those devices, officials of the unification ministry said.
"There is a list of banned items like mobile phones, newspapers and CDs. Before,
they would confiscate them with some fines and let people go, but these days they
categorically don't allow the people to enter," a ministry official overseeing
the Kaesong complex said, requesting anonymity.
The tightened move appeared to be part of a broader North Korean sanction against
South Korea called the "Dec. 1 measure," which cut the number of South Koreans
allowed in Kaesong by half and reduced border traffic to retaliate Seoul's
hard-line stance.
More than 90 South Korean firms operate in the Kaesong complex, just a few
kilometers north of the inter-Korean border, joining South Korean capital and
technology with cheap but skilled North Korean labor to produce watches, clothes
and kitchenware.
hkim@yna.co.kr
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