N. Korea walks out of talks, analysts warn of more nuke tests
By ANIThursday, February 10, 2011
SEOUL - Talks between officials of South and North Korea have broken down, suggesting that Pyongyang could now be taking steps to burgeon its nuclear program.
South Korea’s chief negotiator Colonel Moon Sang-kyun said the three-member North Korean team got up abruptly and walked out of the room without shaking hands and without comment in the “truce village” of Panmunjom.
“Their attitude changed this afternoon,” the Christian Science Monitor (CSM) quoted Colonel Moon Sang-kyun, as saying after returning to Seoul with the two other members of the South Korean team.
He added: “They (North Korean delegation) changed their minds.”
“I believe North Korea is preparing for the next nuclear test,” says Baek Seung-joo, director of the center for security and strategy at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses reflecting the assessment of some intelligence analysts.
North Korea staged its first nuclear test in October 2006 during a break in six-party talks. It conducted its second nuclear test in May 2009.
“This is just the beginning. They are both playing a tug of war. They will have some time and then they will continue negotiations again,” said Paik Hak-soon,” a long-time North Korea scholar at the Sejong Institute. (ANI)
