[Yonhap News Photo]
North Korea dampened South Korean President Moon Jae-in's peace initiative to resume cross-border exchanges in an angry response to the latest round of tough UN sanctions against the nuclear-armed country.
The Korean Sharing Movement (KSM), a non-governmental organization in Seoul, has been allowed to ship medical aid to help North Korea combat malaria. It would be the first cross-border contact in nearly 17 months.
Pyongyang, however, refused to accept KSM's medical aid. "As a result, we have canceled our planned shipment," a KSM official told Aju News. North Korea apparently changed its mind after South Korea supported new UN sanctions imposed last week.
Malaria was eradicated on the Korean peninsula three decades ago but emerged again in the 1990s when North Korea was battered by a series of natural disasters and famines. Mosquitoes carrying the virus have crossed the border to infect hundreds each year in the South.
Starting with KSM, Seoul has approved a series of requests from civilian groups to contact North Korea for cross-border civilian exchanges and the shipment of humanitarian aid to North Korea.
Relations were strained in March 2010 when Seoul blamed a North Korean submarine for torpedoing the warship Cheonan. The incident froze cross-border exchanges and trade, and South Korea suspended almost all civilian inter-Korean exchanges in January 2016.
Lim Chang-won = cwlim34@ajunews.com
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
