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SEOUL: North Korea Tuesday denounced an upcoming US-South Korean military exercise as a prelude to war, a day after holding rare top-level military talks to ease tensions with Seoul and its allies.
Follow-up talks will be held this week, even though sources said the North used Monday's 32-minute meeting to criticise next week's military drill.
Fears of a border clash have grown after the North on January 30 scrapped peace accords with Seoul and warned of war.
It is also preparing to fire a rocket for what it calls a satellite launch, although Seoul and Washington say the real purpose is to test a missile that could theoretically reach Alaska.
Minju Joson, Pyongyang's government newspaper, said the March 9-20 exercise in South Korea aimed to ignite war and warned that the North's army would "firmly crush" any provocations.
The drill "is a serious military threat to our republic and also an extremely dangerous fire play aimed at provoking a new war," the paper said.
On Saturday the communist state's military warned US troops to stop "provocations" inside a border buffer zone or face retaliation.
Monday's talks at Panmunjom inside the zone were requested by the North. They were the first for almost seven years between generals from North Korea and from the US-led UN Command (UNC).
Yonhap news agency said the North and the UNC would hold a colonel-level meeting Wednesday and a second round of general-level talks on Friday.
A UNC spokesman said more talks would be held this week but gave no details.
In a statement, the UNC said delegates on Monday discussed ways to ease tensions and agreed to further talks. It said the dialogue could help build trust but gave no details of proceedings.
Sources told AFP the North's team had demanded a halt to the Key Resolve/Foal Eagle exercise, which will involve a US aircraft carrier, 26,000 US troops and some 30,000-40,000 South Korean troops.
A US-led UN force fought for the South in the 1950-53 war. The United States still stations 28,500 troops to back up its 680,000-strong military against the North's 1.1 million-member armed forces.
Pyongyang complains each year about the exercise, which the UNC says is purely defensive. But tensions are higher than normal and Seoul's troops are on alert for possible border clashes.
The North is angry at South Korea's conservative leader Lee Myung-Bak, who scrapped his predecessors' policy of offering virtually unconditional aid to Pyongyang.
Analysts believe the North's threats against the South, and the planned missile launch, aim to press Lee to soften his policy and to grab the attention of the new US administration.
The new US envoy on North Korea, Stephen Bosworth, is touring China, Japan and South Korea this week. He will discuss ways to dissuade the North from a launch and try to persuade it to resume stalled nuclear disarmament talks.
- AFP/yb
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