South Korea Halts Aid To North

The South Korean government has stopped all humanitarian aid to the North until the Pyongyang government returns to the negotiating table to hammer out an agreement on nuclear nonproliferation. This appears to have been what made the North Koreans storm out of negotiations as I noted here.

The decision to postpone consideration of a North Korean request for 500,000 tons of rice marked the South's first punitive action against its impoverished communist neighbor since it defied the international community and test fired seven missiles, including a long-range Taepodong-2, on July 4.

The move came as the administration of South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun has come under sharp public criticism at home for what many there viewed as a weak response by Seoul to the North's missile tests.

South Korea on Thursday reiterated its deep opposition to a push by Japan and the United States to impose broader sanctions on North Korea through a draft resolution at the United Nation's Security Council. Seoul has also vowed to maintain its "sunshine policy" of engagement, which has fostered the warmest ties between the Stalinist North and capitalist South since the Korean War divided them in two more than half a century ago.

But the decision to follow through with a previous threat to suspend food aid if North Korea tested missiles — a threat many experts doubted the South Koreans would stick to — displayed a new willingness by the South to use its significant economic clout to apply pressure on the North.

The North Koreans — for whom economic assistance by South Korea is topped only by China — appeared jolted by the decision. At talks being held in the South Korean city of Pusan that were originally scheduled to end Friday, Pyongyang's delegation abruptly departed Thursday afternoon.

Also, the South Koreans made it abundantly clear that they were not at all happy with the North.

South Korean officials, who in recent years have rolled out the red carpet for their visiting North Korean kin, this time offered them a simple meal and welcome bereft of customary sightseeing excursions and photo opportunities. When the North's representatives understood they would not be returning with promises for more food aid, they simply left.

"The North Korean side expressed their position that additional negotiations would be unnecessary under the circumstance that additional humanitarian aid they need would be impossible," Lee Kwan Se, a South Korean Unification Ministry official, told reporters.

From what I know of Korean culture (which is not a huge amount, but a bit) this is a pretty big deal. The culture there is all about "face" and this was a deliberate slight by the South. Right about now, I'd love to be a fly on the wall in Kim Jong Il's office. Methinks there's a midget throwing a major snit in there. The problem is, of course, that he's already quite insane. This won't improve his mental health.