DPRK May Reconsider Moratorium on Missile Launches

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, November 18, 2002

DPRK May Reconsider Moratorium on Missile Launches

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) may reconsider its moratorium on missile launches if Japan failed to redeem its past, a spokesman for the DPRK Foreign Ministry said on Saturday.

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The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) may reconsider its moratorium on missile launches if Japan failed to redeem its past, a spokesman for the DPRK Foreign Ministry said on Saturday.

"There is no reason for the DPRK to show magnanimity any longer as regards the issue of missile test-fire as the Japanese side backpedaled on its commitment to redeem its past over the issue of kidnapping," the spokesman said in an interview with the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

It was the Japanese side that first broke its promise to send five abducted Japanese back to the DPRK, he said.

During an unprecedented summit last September, DPRK leader Kim Jong Il acknowledged to Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi that 13 Japanese nationals were kidnapped by the DPRK during the 1970s and 1980s.

Five of them went to Japan in mid-October for a fortnight long visit, but the Japanese government refused to send them back and demanded Pyongyang send their families to Japan before deciding their future. The two sides have yet to reach an agreement on the issue.

"The people of the DPRK are indignant that Japan made a fuss about the abduction issue while ignoring its criminal rule over the Korean Peninsula from 1910-1945, and therefore it is necessary to reconsider the moratorium on missile launches," the spokesman said.

The DPRK agreed to extend its moratorium on missile tests beyond 2003 in the Pyongyang Declaration, signed by Kim Jong Il and Koizumi.

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