By DPA,
Seoul : North Korea Friday charged South Korea with creating an atmosphere in which war could break out at any time, a day after an international inquiry found that a North Korean torpedo caused the sinking of a South Korean warship.
South Korean President Lee Myung Bak, meanwhile, called a national security meeting to discuss his government’s response after he vowed Thursday to take “resolute countermeasures” against what he called the North’s “military provocation”.
North Korea retorted Friday that it would rip up a non-aggression pact with its neighbour and freeze relations with it if Seoul retaliates for the March sinking of its Cheonan warship, which killed 46 sailors.
“From now on, we will regard the present situation as a phase of a war and decisively respond to all matters arising in inter-Korean relations,” said a statement from North Korea’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea that was reported in South Korean media.
It called Thursday’s charge that one of its submarines had ventured into South Korean waters in the Yellow Sea March 26 and fired a torpedo that sank the Cheonan a “ridiculous charade” and said it would react with “merciless punishment” to any retaliation Seoul might carry out.
The multinational team of experts who investigated the sinking came to their conclusions by examining parts of a torpedo recovered at the wreck site.
Meanwhile, the South’s National Security Council met for the first time since communist North Korea conducted its second nuclear test a year ago. The council consists of the prime minister; foreign, defence and unification ministers; and the head of the intelligence agency.