N. Korea Demands US, S. Korea Get Out of Buffer Zone

Warning comes days after suspected attack on S. Korean ship
By Jane Yager,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 29, 2010 3:42 AM CDT
N. Korea Demands US, S. Korea Get Out of Buffer Zone
South Korean Marines patrol in search for missing crew members of a sunken naval ship on the beach on South Korea's Baengnyeong Island on Monday, March 29, 2010.   (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

If the US and South Korea don't stop allowing tourists and journalists into the buffer zone on the heavily armed border between North and South Korea, the North will retaliate with “unpredictable incidents including the loss of human lives in this area for which the US side will be wholly to blame,” Pyongyang warned today. Belligerence like this is typical for North Korea, but the warning came amidst high tensions over North Korea's suspected sinking of a South Korean vessel.

The statement form North Korea, which called tours in the "demilitarized zone" a form of "psychological warfare," was particularly troubling to South Koreans as it came only three days after the South Korean naval patrol ship went down. The incident tapped into the South's deep-seated fears about the North Korean military, the New York Times reports. (More North Korea stories.)

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