Inter-Korean trade on the decline: customs office

SEOUL, June 21 (Yonhap) -- Trade between the divided Koreas has fallen for the
ninth straight month year-on-year, the customs office here said Sunday, as
cross-border economic exchanges are threatened by boiling tension on the
peninsula.
According to the South's Korea Customs Service, the volume of trade between the
Koreas reached US$106.5 million in May, a fall of 38 percent from $171.9 million
in the same month of last year.
The May figure represented the ninth consecutive monthly on-year decrease in
inter-Korean trade since September last year.
The decline reflected a downturn in inter-Korean ties that have soured since
President Lee Myung-bak took office in February last year with a pledge to link
the denuclearization of North Korea to the North-bound aid shipments.
Calling Lee "a traitor," Pyongyang has threatened armed conflicts along the
border and imposed stricter regulations on South Koreans working at a joint
industrial complex in the North Korean border town of Kaesong.
The complex is one of the last remaining symbols of inter-Korean reconciliation
that grew from the 2000 summit between the Koreas, which still remain technically
at war after the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce.
A South Korean company has recently pulled out of the borderline factory park,
while a South Korean worker has been detained by North Korea on charges of
defaming its leadership since March.
Further raising tension, North Korea fired a series of long- and short-range
missiles this year and conducted its second nuclear test in late May.
The provocative moves have prompted the U.N. Security Council to pass a
resolution tightening sanctions on the isolated communist regime.
samkim@yna.co.kr
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