Politics

Pyongyang rejects Seoul’s offer of economic support for disarmament

Seoul, Aug 19 (EFE).- The sister of North Korea’s leader Kim Yo-jong categorically rejected the offer of economic aid in exchange for disarmament proposed this week by South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol, whose proposal she called “absurd.”

“Even before pondering the ‘policy towards the North’ of the South Korean authorities, we can say we do not like Yoon Suk-yeol himself,” Kim Jong-un’s sister wrote in a statement published Thursday by the KCNA news agency.

Kim, deputy director of North Korea’s one-party propaganda department, said the regime would never “sit face-to-face with him” whatever offer he puts forward.

Her words come four days after Yoon proposed an economic assistance plan he called bold and promised Pyongyang a phased program of food assistance, economic support and investment in infrastructure if the regime denuclearized.

“Dogs, whether as a puppy or an adult, always bark, and the same can be said for one who holds the title of ‘president,'” Kim said of Yoon, whose plan she said was identical to the one proposed by former President Lee Myung-bak of South Korea who governed from 2008 to 2013.

After the rapprochement between Pyongyang, Seoul and Washington between 2018 and 2019 during the liberal Moon Jae-in’s mandate in Seoul, Kim said Thursday that no similar situation would be repeated under the current conservative government in the South.

“The rogue who speaks of a ‘bold plan’ today and organizes military exercises against the North the next day is none other than the ‘genius’ of Yoon Suk-yeol,” Kim said, referring to joint exercises that will resume Monday for the first time since 2018 between Washington and Seoul in South Korea.

After the failure of the Hanoi summit in 2019 and with Pyongyang completely isolated from the outside since the pandemic began, the regime has embarked on a weapons modernization plan to which allies are responding with plans to increase the deployment of military assets on the peninsula.

Pyongyang has also completed preparations for its first nuclear test in five years, and Seoul and Washington this week reaffirmed their intention to respond by deploying US strategic assets to the region should the North Korean military carry out the test. EFE

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