NKorea denounces drill as "crime" against six-nation talks

0 Comments | AFP, February, 2008

SEOUL (AFP) — North Korea on Sunday denounced an upcoming US-South Korean joint military drill as "an intolerable crime" running counter to six-nation talks aimed at the nuclear disarmament of the Stalinist state.

The March 2-7 joint exercise will be the first to test Seoul's ability to wage war under a scenario in which South Korea has regained wartime control of its troops from the United States.

Rodong Sinmun, the North's communist party newspaper and main official mouthpiece, had a different view of the drill, which replaces a previous annual joint exercise between the two countries.

"The war exercise in South Korea is an intolerable crime against peace and reunification casting a chill over the Korean nation's desire for reunification and putting a...