TOKYO — North Korea threatened Tuesday to abandon the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War if the United States launches sanctions to punish the country for trying to develop nuclear weapons.
The threat came a day after reports that the Bush administration is developing plans for sanctions against Pyongyang that would include halting its weapons shipments and cutting off the flow of money from Koreans living in Japan. Such money is crucial to North Korea and helps to keep its economy afloat.
North Korea’s threat increases tensions in Asia while the United States would prefer to focus on another troublesome adversary, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
Pyongyang upped the ante in its war of words with the United States, charging that Washington is poised to launch a military blockade that would cripple the country.
A spokesman for the North Korean People’s Army said such a move would force his nation to abandon the cease-fire that has left the Korean peninsula divided for 50 years.
“The KPA (Korean People’s Army) side will be left with no option but to take a decisive step to abandon its commitment to implement the armistice agreement as a signatory to it and free itself from the binding force of all its provisions, regarding the possible sanctions to be taken by the U.S. side against the DPRK (North Korea),” said the statement, issued by the Korea Central News Agency, quoting a military spokesman.
The spokesman said the “grave situation created by the undisguised war acts committed by the U.S. in breach of the armistice agreement compels the Korean People’s Army side, its warring party, to immediately take all steps to cope with it.
“If the U.S. side continues violating and misusing the armistice agreement as it pleases, there will be no need for the (North) to remain bound to the armistice agreement uncomfortably.”
North and South Korea remain technically at war, and North Korea’s withdrawal from the armistice would theoretically leave Pyongyang free to launch new assaults against South Korea. Its withdrawal also would force the United Nations to abandon its peacekeeping mission in the demilitarized zones. U.S. soldiers stationed along the tense border between the countries technically serve under U.N. Command. U.N. forces signed the original treaty with North Korea and China.
Last week, the International Atomic Energy Agency voted to ask the U.N. Security Council to explore ways to force Pyongyang to comply with an international treaty banning proliferation of nuclear weapons. North Korea recently bowed out of the treaty and booted international inspectors out of the country, saying it intends to start producing electricity from its tiny reactor at Yongbyon. Weapons experts think the country intends to reprocess spent plutonium to develop nuclear bombs.
The North Koreans fear that the Bush administration intends to attack its regime after concluding a military campaign against Iraq, and they say that only face-to-face talks with Washington can resolve the standoff.
The country demands a non-aggression pact promising North Korea’s sovereignty.