North Korea blasts March U.S.-South military drill

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North Korea blasts March U.S.-South military drill

North Korea repeated its criticism Tuesday of the joint military exercise to be held by South Korean and U.S. forces on the peninsula starting Thursday. A spokesman for the North Korean Foreign Ministry declared that the military exercise was a "hostile act" diametrically opposed to the June 15 North-South Joint Declaration, in which the countries committed themselves to reconciliation and unity. The statement was first reported Monday by the Korea Central News Agency and repeated Tuesday.

U.S. Forces Korea announced last month that it would combine two exercises - Reception, Staging, and Onward Movement Integration and Exercise Foal Eagle - in the week-long exercise with South Korean troops.

The North's spokesman called the exercise a "plan for preemptive strikes" on the part of the United States and said the Bush administration's call for talks was "nothing but a deceptive trick to cover up their war plan." The ministry warned Washington that the people and army of North Korea are fully prepared in case of war to defend and unify the Korean Peninsula.

The South Korean government, called "bellicose" by the official, was warned as well. "No one can predict how adversely these war maneuvers will affect inter-Korean relations," the North Korean spokesman said.

Joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises, customary before 2000, were toned down last year as a nod to improving relations with the North. However, with the Bush administration's anti-terrorism efforts since Sept. 11, there has been a recent surge in joint military exercises involving U.S. forces stationed in East Asia.

"From the hyped reaction North Korea is showing, we should expect progress in North-South talks only after the military exercise ends on March 27," a South Korean government official said.

by Lee Young-jong

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