Lee says tough reaction to N. Korea`s provocations necessary for peace

Lee says tough reaction to N. Korea's provocations necessary for peace

By Lee Chi-dong

2010/12/23 16:56 KST

SEOUL, Dec. 23 (Yonhap) -- President Lee Myung-bak said Thursday that strong counter-blows against North Korea's attacks are a way to keep peace on the peninsula, as his military held a large-scale air and ground drill near the heavily armed inter-Korean border.

"I thought patience would bring peace to this land, but (the reality) was not so," Lee said during a rare visit to a front-line army unit in Yanggu, Gangwon Province, which also took him to a guard post about one kilometer from North Korea.

Lee said he realized that only tough action against the North's attacks enables South Korea to maintain peace, deter the communist neighbor from provoking further and prevent a war.

North Korea last month bombarded Yeonpyeong, a South Korean island just south of the Yellow Sea border, in what was another reminder of the fragility of peace on the peninsula. The 1950-53 Korean War ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty.

The conservative Lee administration vowed immediate military retaliation should Pyongyang attack again.

The president also stressed the importance of national unity in the face of the North's perennial threats, saying Pyongyang believes its provocation will split the South Korean public. "We can prevent (the North) from taking provocative acts through strong unity together with powerful response," Lee said.

Lee said it is hard to predict where and how the North will resume attacks. "We don't know whether North Korea's provocation will come in the western or eastern area. That is why I came to this eastern region," he said.

He criticized the North's leadership for sticking to nuclear weapons development while its people suffer from chronic hunger.

"Unfortunately, the world's most belligerent group is in the North," he said. "Folks there are starving. The money used to make atomic bombs could have fed all the people."

South Korea's military staged one of its largest-ever exercises Thursday at training grounds in Pocheon, Gyeonggi Province, in which about 800 troops, tanks, other heavy weaponry and fighter jets were mobilized. Earlier this week, the South's marines held a live-fire artillery drill from Yeonpyeong Island.

Source: english.yonhapnews.co.kr

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