Korean army to do all necessary self-defence measures-command.

8/3 Tass 63

PYONGYANG, March 8 (Itar-Tass) - The North Korean armed forces have
been put on high alert in connection with the large-scale American - South
Korean manoeuvres "Key Resolve - Foal Eagle 2010" that were launched on
Monday.

It is said in a statement of the Command of the Korean People's Army
(KPA) transmitted through the channels of the North's official Korean
Central News Agency (KCNA) that all North Korean soldiers and officers
must reliably defend the forward frontiers, including the coast and
airspace of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and
decisively stop the aggressors' attempts to deliver a strike.
The KPA Command also turned to the nation with an appeal to take an
active part in the building of a powerful socialist state, preserving the
feeling of hatred to the enemies of the people's republic with a rifle in
one hand and with a sickle and hammer - in another. The KPA will take all
the necessary self-defence measures, in order to ensure reliable defence
from the external threat, the statement says.
On Sunday, a spokesman for the Panmunjom Mission of the Korean
People's Army issued a statement in connection with the fact that the US
and the South Korean authorities finally set about the DPRK-targeted Key
Resolve and Foal Eagle joint military manoeuvres. The manoeuvres clearly
indicate once again that the US and the South Korean authorities are the
harassers of peace and warmongers keen to bring a war to this land.
The statement says that under the prevailing situation the Panmunjom
Mission of the KPA is authorized to state as follows: The revolutionary
armed forces of the DPRK will no longer be bound to the Armistice
Agreement and the north-south agreement on non-aggression. There is no
reason whatsoever for the DPRK to remain bounded to the AA and the
non-aggression agreement now that the other belligerent party scrapped the
AA and the other dialogue partner reneged on the non-aggression agreement.
The revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK will, therefore, legitimately
exercise their force for self-defence, unhindered, just as they had
determined to do.
The process for the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula will
naturally come to a standstill and the DPRK bolster its nuclear deterrent
for self-defence given that the sabre-rattling is proven to be nuclear war
exercises and manoeuvres for a war of aggression against the DPRK in its
nature, it says.
According to the statement, it is an inviolable right of the
revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK for self-defence to counter with
powerful nuclear deterrent the US nuclear offensive means threatening the
territorial waters and air and land of the DPRK on account of exercises.
The revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK will be left with no option
but to exercise merciless physical force as the rival is set to do harm to
the DPRK no matter how dear peace, national reconciliation and cooperation
are to it, it says. It is their stand to settle accounts with the rival by
actual use of military force if it does not wish neither to conclude a
peace treaty nor have reconciliation and cooperation.
All DPRK-US and the inter-Korean military dialogues will be suspended
as long as the DPRK-targeted war exercises go on. It is illogical to sit
face to face with the dialogue partner, who brings dark clouds of a
nuclear war while levelling its gun at the other party, and discuss
"peace" and "cooperation" with him. The US and the South Korean
authorities should bear in mind that their reckless military acts will
bring them nothing but bitter disgrace and destruction, according to the
statement.
The Key Resolve and Foal Eagle exercise, slated for March 8-18, will
draw 18,000 US troops including 10,000 stationed in South Korea and 8,000
from abroad, Combined Forces Command spokesman Kim Yong-Kyus said earlier,
according to the AFP news agency .
Some 26,000 US troops took part in the exercise last year.
"An aircraft carrier which came last year will not participate this
time," the spokesman said, adding that the scaling-down of the exercise
was governed only by operational considerations. The defence ministry gave
no figure for the number of South Korean troops taking part but said an
army corps, naval fleets and wings of the air force would be involved, AFP
reported.
The US-led United Nations Command has already informed the North about
the exercise dates and their routine nature. The US, South Korea and other
negotiators are trying to bring the communist North back to nuclear
disarmament talks which it quit last April.
In May 2009, North Korea defiantly staged its second atomic weapons
test, incurring tougher UN sanctions. It insists these should be lifted
before talks resume and also wants a US commitment to hold discussions
about a permanent peace treaty between the two sides.
The 1950-53 Korean War, in which the United States led an
international force under the UN flag, ended only in an armistice. The US
has based troops in South Korea ever since and currently has 28,500 there.
-0-ezh/gor


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