[USFK Forums] S. Korean separated families head home after 11-hour delay [Yonhap]

[C. Y. Lee]

Uploaded by C. Y. Lee on Thursday, March 23, 2006

(3rd LD) S. Korean separated families head home after 11-hour delay

2006/03/22 23:41

MOUNT GEUMGANG, North Korea, March 22 (Yonhap) -- South Korean families taking part in an ongoing round of family reunions at Mount Geumgang, North Korea, were to return to the South on Wednesday after a 10-hour delay due to North Korean protests against reports on South Koreans held in the communist state.

The group, consisting 99 South Koreans and accompanying family members to the Red Cross-sponsored family reunions here, left shortly after 11:10 p.m. and was expected to cross the inter-Korean border around midnight.

The departure came after a decision by South Korea's broadcaster SBS to pull out its reporter covering the reunions between North and South Korean families separated by the countries' division at the North Korean mountain resort.

"(The reporter) will pull out, not as a submission to the North's pressure, but based on our own decision," the South Korean broadcaster said in a statement.

"The fact that the reporter would be no longer able to cover the event was also considered."
The North had virtually held the South Korean families hostage, saying they would let the South Koreans go only "after the SBS reporter boarded" their bus, which was originally scheduled to depart at 1 p.m.

The decision by the South Korean broadcaster also followed an earlier threat by the North to deal with the South Korean reporter in accordance with its own domestic law unless the reporter left the country within 30 minutes of its notice at 8:35 p.m.

The standoff came as North Korean officials protested reports by the SBS reporter and another from MBC on the reunion of a South Korean fisherman long ago abducted to the North with his wife from the South at the start of the three-day event on Monday.

North Korean officials claimed the South Korean reporters' description of the 76-year-old former South Korean Cheon Moon-seok as an abductee disrespected their country and physically blocked the South Korean broadcasters from transmitting their reports from the communist state.

Nearly 1,000 South Korean prisoners from the 1950-53 Korean War and civilians seized since the war's end are believed to be still alive in the North, but the communist state denies holding anyone against their will, claiming the people defected voluntarily.

Cheon was one of three people or their families from the North at the 13th round of separated family reunions, who were categorized by the Seoul government as "special participants.

The others included a North Korean son of a former South Korean POW who came to see his 74-year-old uncle from the South.

The ongoing round of the Red Cross-sponsored family reunions is to last until Saturday with a second group of 436 South Koreans to travel here on Thursday for a three-day meeting with their long-lost relatives from the North.

The Koreas, divided by a fragile armistice treaty signed at the end of the fratricidal Korean War, have held 12 rounds of the family reunions to reunite some 12,000 families from the two sides following the historic inter-Korean summit in June 2000.

bdk@yna.co.kr
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