US FORCES IN S. KOREA ARE CANCER-LIKE ENTITY

A spokesman for the Institute for Disarmament and Peace of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the DPRK released the following statement on September 5 on the lapse of 69 years since the US occupied south Korea: The upcoming September 8 marks 69 years since the US forces occupied south Korea.

After illegally occupying south Korea under the pretext of "disarming the Japanese army"  following Japan's unconditional surrender at the end of the Second World War, the US forces in south Korea took the lead in carrying out Washington's strategy for escalating confrontation and tensions on the Korean peninsula and in the rest of Northeast Asia during the Cold War.

The landscape of the relations in Northeast Asia has undergone a drastic change since the demise of the Cold War but the US forces are still present in south Korea. This cannot but be an anachronistic mistake. What is most serious in the activities conducted by the US forces in south Korea are the joint military exercises that cause an evil cycle of tensions on the peninsula. The US and the puppet forces in south Korea try to justify those joint military exercises as "annual and defensive ones", but even the Western countries admit that they pose a serious threat to peace and security on the peninsula. The US-led joint military exercises can never be tolerated as they are very dangerous sabre-rattling that can cause catastrophic consequences on the peninsula in the light of their nature, scale and frequency.

Before and after the Cold War there took place in Europe frequent joint military exercises between the eastern and western blocs but coercive measures were taken to restrict their scale. Each party undertook not to carry out simultaneously more than three military activities, each involving over 13 000 troops. No party was allowed to carry out within two calendar years more than one military activity involving over 40 000 troops. The 1986 Stockholm CSBM Document stated that they would refrain from the threat or use of force against any state, regardless of that state's political, social, economic or cultural system. No words like drills for occupying capital of other country and drills for a preemptive nuclear attack could ever be found. More importantly, normal state-to-state relations existed among regional countries and regular communications channel existed.

But the joint military exercises under various codenames which the US forces in south Korea stage in collusion with the south Korean puppet forces number more than 40 each year and the troops involved in them reach over 500 000. They apply even the "tailored deterrence strategy" aimed at a preemptive nuclear attack on the

DPRK and openly stage the drill of "occupying Pyongyang" with the involvement of strategic nuclear bombers, nuclear carrier and nuclear-powered submarines.

As retaliation against the US step taken in 2001 to adopt it as its policy to mount a preemptive nuclear attack on the DPRK, the latter was compelled to have access to nuclear weapons. As the US and the south Korean puppet forces made a decision to apply the preemptive nuclear attack on the DPRK to a substantial operation in 2012, the DPRK was also compelled to acquire preemptive nuclear attack capabilities to cope with it.

Now on the Korean peninsula the Armistice Agreement was ratified and the channel for communication is in a fragile state due to the US, to say nothing of normalizing relations between the two hostile parties. Under this situation the confrontation between the two sides armed with nuclear weapons can easily lead to the misunderstanding of the other party and nuclear disaster. This indicates that the danger of joint military exercises which the US regularly stage on the peninsula is incomparably bigger than in any other region.

The joint military exercises are held on the peninsula, not in the land of the US because of the aggressive nature of the US forces in south Korea. The US should have sought the settlement through negotiation of the questions of the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Korea, the peaceful settlement of the Korean question within three months and have had its forces withdrawn from south Korea as was stipulated in the 1953 Korean Armistice Agreement. It was also obliged to immediately implement the resolution made at the 30th Session of the UN General Assembly in 1975 that called for disbanding the "UN Command" and pulling the US forces out of south Korea. In 1992 the north-south agreement was adopted and an alternative arrangement was also provided as requested by the US.

And the north and the south agreed on their political will and ways for solving the question of  the country's reunification and peace by the Koreans themselves in the June 15 North-South Joint Declaration in 2000 and the October 4 Declaration in 2007. This left the US with no justifications to keep its forces in south Korea. It is, therefore, self-evident that had the US forces pulled out of south Korea, the situation would not have deteriorated due to the military exercises on the peninsula.

But the US concluded the "mutual defense treaty" with south Korea, introduced nuclear weapons into south Korea, formed south Korea-US "Combined Forces Command", staged Team Spirit, Key Resolve, Foal Eagle and Ulji Freedom Guardian joint military exercises and attempted to reorganize the "UN Command" on an expansion basis, thus highlighting the aggressive nature of its forces in south Korea.

The US forces in south Korea are not under the control of the UN nor peace-keeping forces sent to dispute-torn areas under the UN resolutions. The purpose of their presence in south Korea and the program of their operations are all aimed to invade the DPRK and hold a military edge in Northeast Asia.

They are the root cause of instability not only on the Korean peninsula but in the rest of Northeast Asia. To cope with the joint naval exercises staged among the US, Japan and south Korea every year from 2012, neighbouring countries also staged regular joint naval military exercises in the waters around the peninsula. The US attempt to deploy in south Korea THAAD under the pretext of "protecting" its forces in south Korea has sparked off a serious concern among neighbouring countries that south Korea will become the target of a nuclear attack by other countries, thereby creating a serious situation.

As the US increases its military pressure on the DPRK with its forces in south Korea as a main player, the DPRK is also taking measures for self-defence on an annual and regular basis. Not only the neighbouring countries but the UN and the international community should pay a due attention to the joint military exercises seriously threatening the peace and security on the peninsula and in the region and the US forces in south Korea which play a key role in them.