Asia-Pacific

DPRK calls for end of hostile US ties

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-01-01 15:10

PYONGYANG: The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) called on Friday for an end to the hostile relationship between Pyongyang and Washington while reiterating its push for a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.

In a joint New Year editorial released by KCNA, the DPRK said "the fundamental task for ensuring peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and in the rest of Asia is to put an end to the hostile relationship between the DPRK and the USA."

"It is the consistent stand of the DPRK to establish a lasting peace system on the Korean Peninsula and make it nuclear-free through dialogue and negotiations," the editorial said.

"The Workers' Party of Korea and the government of the DPRK will strive to develop relations of good-neighborliness and friendship with other countries and achieve global independence under the unfurled banner of independence, peace and friendship," it said.

The call came as Washington was trying to get the state to return to the stalled six-party talks.

The DPRK shut down the Yongbyon nuclear facilities in 2007 under a six-nation nuclear disarmament deal. However, Pyongyang quit the multilateral talks last year in anger over international criticism of its long-range rocket test.

It conducted an underground nuclear test in May and declared it was in the final phase of an experimental, highly enriched uranium program -- another way to make an atomic bomb.

However, tensions began to thaw recently, and the DPRK has expressed willingness to return to the six-party talks involving itself, the United States, China, Republic of Korea (ROK), Japan and Russia, if it had satisfactory talks with Washington.

In early December, the two countries agreed on the need to resume the negotiations during President Barack Obama's envoy's trip to Pyongyang.

As for inter-Korean relations, the joint editorial called for accelerating national reunification and encouraging cooperation on exchanges between the two peoples.

It urged the ROK government to stop aggravating the confrontation and tension, vowing to "frustrate all challenges of the anti-reunification forces."

The top priority of the new year was to "conduct a sweeping campaign to bring about a drastic turn in improving the people's standard of living," the joint editorial said.