19 Jan 2009

NKorean newspaper renews threats against SKorea

North Korea's main newspaper said Monday that the communist nation does not engage in "empty talk," heightening tensions surrounding its threat to take military action to counter what it calls South Korean plans to invade.

North Korea's military accused South Korean President Lee Myung-bak on Saturday of plotting an invasion of the North and warned of strong military steps in retaliation and "an all-out confrontational posture." South Korea denied it was planning to invade, and puts its military on alert.

South Korea said Monday it had detected no unusual moves by the North's military, and Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho-nyeon said Seoul will cope with the situation in a "calm" manner.

The North's main Rodong Sinmun newspaper renewed the country's warnings on Monday, saying it would "destroy and wipe out" invaders in "one strike" if South Korean "war maniacs ignite the fire of war."

"The Lee Myung-bak group should bear in mind that our guns and bayonets ... are aimed at their throats," the paper said in a commentary, carried by the official Korean Central News Agency. "We know no empty talk."

The Associated Press