DPRK FM Spokesman Demands Pullout of U.S. Forces from S. Korea

Pyongyang, September 8 (KCNA) -- September 8 this year marks 71 years since the U.S. military occupation of south Korea. A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry of the DPRK in a statement Wednesday said that the 70-odd history of the U.S. forces' presence in south Korea has been the one in which war, confrontation and escalation of tension have persisted on the Korean peninsula, adding that the U.S. forces in south Korea are a cancer-like entity harassing peace and security on the Korean peninsula and in the region and bringing the dark clouds of a thermonuclear war. The statement went on: After the end of the Second World War the U.S. occupied south Korea under the pretext of "disarming" the Imperial Japanese Army. Since then it, pursuant to its aggressive scenario for domination of Asia and world, divided the territory of Korea and the Korean nation and has inflicted the war disaster on the Korean people. For the past six-odd decades since the signing of the Armistice Agreement, the U.S. introduced into south Korea and its vicinity huge aggression forces including nuclear weapons and staged the DPRK-targeted war exercises under various codenames, steadily escalating the tension on the Korean peninsula and in the region. The U.S. forces in south Korea have turned into "strategic task force" capable of intervening in any dispute in the region under the signboard of "strategic flexibility" and this has made its aggressive nature clearer. Recently, THAAD which includes even countries around Korea within the radius of operation was decided to be deployed in the U.S. forces in south Korea. The situation clearly proves that unless the U.S. forces are withdrawn from south Korea as early as possible, it would be impossible to expect lasting peace and security on the peninsula and in Northeast Asia. The U.S. has to clearly face up to the strategic position of the DPRK which ranked itself among the nuclear powers and the trend of the times and roll back its anachronistic hostile policy toward the DPRK, replace the Armistice Agreement with a peace treaty and withdraw its aggression troops and war means from south Korea at once. -0-