ID :
93128
Fri, 12/04/2009 - 09:35
Auther :
Shortlink :
https://oananews.org//node/93128
The shortlink copeid
S. Korean PM says humanitarian aid to North must continue despite tension
SEOUL, Dec. 3 (Yonhap) -- Prime Minister Chung Un-chan said Thursday that South Korea must continue humanitarian aid to North Korea regardless of the political tension that has often weakened inter-Korean assistance.
"Inter-Korean relations have been strained since last year, but humanitarian
assistance to North Korean children cannot be compromised," Chung said in an
opening speech at a gathering of a fledgling aid organization, Share Together
Society.
South Korea temporarily banned humanitarian aid workers from traveling to the
North, as well as their shipments of aid in the spring after tension spiked due
to the North's long-range rocket and nuclear tests. Such restrictions eased as
political relations improved with the North's shift to conciliatory diplomacy in
August.
Chung, an economist and former president of Seoul National University who assumed
his current post in September, gave a rather stern view on the conservative
government's policy of conditioning inter-Korean exchanges on progress in
Pyongyang's denuclearization.
"I think -- this is my personal view -- that the government should come up with a
clearer position about the matter of humanitarian assistance to North Korea," he
said.
Share Together Society, established in September, said its goal is providing
enough milk to feed 1 million children in the North. It has shipped 20,000 packs
of milk and 500 cans of powdered milk to North Korea in each of its four
shipments so far, and hopes to do so twice a month next year. About 3 million
North Koreans are believed to have died of hunger in the mid-1990s, and 2.5
million of them are allegedly children, the organization claimed.
"We like to contribute to confidence-building between the South and the North by
consistently pursuing this milk campaign," Jung Chang-young, chief of the
organization and former president of Yonsei University, said. "In that sense, we
believe humanitarian assistance to the North should be continued, although the
circumstances sometimes change."
hkim@yna.co.kr
"Inter-Korean relations have been strained since last year, but humanitarian
assistance to North Korean children cannot be compromised," Chung said in an
opening speech at a gathering of a fledgling aid organization, Share Together
Society.
South Korea temporarily banned humanitarian aid workers from traveling to the
North, as well as their shipments of aid in the spring after tension spiked due
to the North's long-range rocket and nuclear tests. Such restrictions eased as
political relations improved with the North's shift to conciliatory diplomacy in
August.
Chung, an economist and former president of Seoul National University who assumed
his current post in September, gave a rather stern view on the conservative
government's policy of conditioning inter-Korean exchanges on progress in
Pyongyang's denuclearization.
"I think -- this is my personal view -- that the government should come up with a
clearer position about the matter of humanitarian assistance to North Korea," he
said.
Share Together Society, established in September, said its goal is providing
enough milk to feed 1 million children in the North. It has shipped 20,000 packs
of milk and 500 cans of powdered milk to North Korea in each of its four
shipments so far, and hopes to do so twice a month next year. About 3 million
North Koreans are believed to have died of hunger in the mid-1990s, and 2.5
million of them are allegedly children, the organization claimed.
"We like to contribute to confidence-building between the South and the North by
consistently pursuing this milk campaign," Jung Chang-young, chief of the
organization and former president of Yonsei University, said. "In that sense, we
believe humanitarian assistance to the North should be continued, although the
circumstances sometimes change."
hkim@yna.co.kr
