[USFK Forums] North Korea delays family reunions [Reuters]

[C. Y. Lee]

Uploaded by C. Y. Lee on Wednesday, March 22, 2006

North Korea delays family reunions

From correspondents in Seoul
21mar06

(Reuters) - NORTH Korea has delayed private meetings of families separated for more than 50 years due to the Korean War, in a protest against wording used by South Korean media on the reunion, pool reports said today.

North Korea was angry that South Korean broadcasters referred to a person shown in TV footage as being "an abductee".
North Korea wanted the person seen in the video tape to be called a "missing person", according to South Korean media pool reports from the reunion.

About 100 South Koreans, many of them elderly, met relatives from the North at a mountain resort in the communist state in a reunion that started yesterday and will finish tomorrow.

The private meetings were delayed for about seven hours. The group includes three families of South Koreans believed to have been held as prisoners of war or civilians abducted against their will and held in the North, officials said.

This is the first reunion since a Red Cross meeting in February, when the North said for the first time it was ready to discuss the fate of South Korean POWs and civilians suspected of being captured and held by the North.

North Korea has asked that people it is suspected of abducting be referred to as missing persons. South Korean officials believe there are more than 540 South Korean POWs and 480 civilians alive in the North.

The reunion is taking place despite North Korea's anger over South Korea's participation in joint military exercises with the US that start next week.

North Korea has said the joint drills are preparation for an invasion and threatened that its Korean People's Army has the right to strike first, if needed.



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