[LETTERS]Do not step back

North Korea, as usual, abruptly announced its stance on the Northern Limit Line that serves as the border between the two Koreas on the West Sea. Accusing the Lee government of choosing tension to peace, it maintained that it will strengthen its military to prepare for “face-to-face war.”

This is just outrageous. The world knows that Kim Jong-il’s regime is a barbaric, illegitimate power which should be criticized in the name of justice. Even as I write this, countless people in the North are being killed by the regime either by hunger or bullets.

The NLL should be kept and protected. The line clearly shows the border between the two countries. Of course, the supporters of the Kim government would say that the NLL is not legitimate, as it was decided unilaterally. True. But since when did North Korea worry about legitimacy? Is killing of innocents ... and making people starve to death legitimate?

North Korea likens President Lee Myung-bak to Hitler and South Korea to a puppet of the United States.

For [the regime in the North], everything concerned with human rights and justice is a slave to the U.S. [I think that] starvation, oppression and suppressing the rights of expression underlie the ideas of juche, and of Kim Il Sung.

North Korea has no right whatsoever to make any comments about peace. How come taking action to protect South Korean citizens is considered going against peace? If there was no illegal government right across our border, South Korea would not have enhanced our forces at the border.

The South Korean government should strengthen protection of the NLL, make it even stronger than the North. The sea behind the NLL belongs to South Korean fishers and citizens, and the government has the responsibility to protect it.

South Korea should be consistent and not [give in to] North Korea. Enough is enough.

The challenge which North Korea made on the weekend should not make us take a step back.

Rather, it is now the time for taking ten steps forward.

Kang Yoon-seung, student, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies

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