PYONGYANG: North Korea is formally abolishing key government agencies working to promote cooperation and reunification with the South Korea, state media reported on Tuesday.
The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said the announcement was made by North Korea’s parliament, and came just weeks after the country’s leader Kim Jong Un stated that seeking reconciliation with South Korea was a mistake.
Inter-Korean ties have sharply deteriorated this year, with Pyongyang’s spy satellite launch prompted Seoul to suspend a 2018 military agreement to defuse tensions.
Kim labelling South Korea as the principal enemy, said that efforts to reconcile and reunify with Soul is a mistake.
North and South Korea claim sovereignty over the whole of the peninsula in their constitutions.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and Republic of Korea were founded 75 years ago but each still considers the other as an illegal entity.
Seoul’s Unification Ministry and Pyongyang’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification until now were working to improve ties between the two Koreas, however, the Supreme People’s Assembly of North Korea abolished its reconciliation agency.
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According to KCNA, the decision adopted by the assembly said the most hostile states, which are at war, are now in acute confrontation on the Korean peninsula.
North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un Kim during a year-end party meeting last month, said peaceful reunification between the two Koreas is impossible. He said the government would make a decisive policy change in ties with South Korea.
Earlier, the US national security spokesperson John Kirby had said that North Korea recently provided ballistic missiles and launchers to Russia to be used in war against Ukraine.
Despite the US allegations both Moscow and Pyongyang deny the weapons supply deal.
