By KUNA
Tokyo : North Korea denounced on Monday a massive joint military exercise by South Korea and the US, calling it nuclear threats and blackmail to the country.
“The exercise is, to all intents and purposes, maneuvers for a nuclear war to seize the DPRK by force of arms in light of their scale and nature,” a spokesman for the North’s Foreign Ministry was quoted by the state-run Korean Central News Agency. DPRK stands for the North’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. “Such nuclear threats and blackmail do not work on the DPRK but will only slow down the process of the denuclearization the Korean Peninsula,” the spokesman warned, adding that Pyongyang will take necessary countermeasures, including those to further bolster all its deterrent power.
According to Seoul’s Yonhap News Agency, South Korea and the US began the six-day military maneuvers code-named “Key Resolve” and “Foal Eagle” on Sunday to deter potential military threats from North Korea. The annual military exercise involves a large portion of South Korea’s 650, 000 troops, as well as about 12,000 US forces stationed in South Korea and 6, 000 US troop reinforcements from US mainland and Pacific bases. Some 28,000 US troops are currently stationed in South Korea as a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War. The two Koreas technically remain at war, as the Korean War ended with an armistice not a peace treaty. This year’s exercises came amid stalled efforts to persuade North Korea to give up its atomic ambitions. The nation conducted a nuclear test in October 2006, ignoring international pressure. Under a major deal agreed at six-party talks grouping the two Koreas, the US, China, Russia and Japan, North Korea was required to disable its key nuclear facilities and declare all its nuclear programs by the end of 2007 in return for economic and political rewards. However, a dispute has developed with the North insisting that the US reneged on its pledge to remove the North from its list of terrorism-sponsoring countries while the US says North Korea had not provided a full list of nuclear programs. Pyongyang claims it provided a full list in November.