North Korea says to freeze assets of South Korean firms at Kaesong

A South Korean security guard stands guard on an empty road which leads to the Kaesong Industrial Complex (KIC) at the South’s CIQ (Customs, Immigration and Quarantine), just south of the demilitarised zone separating the two Koreas, in Paju, South Korea, February 11, 2016.

Seoul has demanded that Pyongyang grant safe passage to all its citizens, but there are concerns that some might find themselves detained if the North Korean authorities try to leverage their release. Some analysts speculated that the North would hold onto some to get all the wages owed North Korean workers.

Meanwhile, a mood of pain, anger and anxiety hung over scores of South Korean businessmen crossing the border Thursday into North Korea to save what they could of a decade-long investment.

China provides most of North Korea’s energy and food imports and has repeatedly rejected tough sanctions like banning oil shipments to the country for fear of destabilizing the regime and triggering a flood of refugees across the countries’ shared border.

Still, Pyongyang took precautions to ensure the workers it hand-picked for the complex had minimal contact with their South Korean managers that could be potentially subversive.

In a state TV broadcast, a North Korean presenter said the “epochal” launch was personally ordered by the leader. (Pictured, a South Korean businessman is surrounded by the media after returning from North Korea’s joint Kaesong Industrial Complex today).

World leaders from the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, and other nations have also spoken out condemning the launch. But at the last minute the employee had to drive back to the factory to unload the clothes because of North Korea’s announcement that it would freeze all South Korean assets there.

“It would be a lie to say I’m not anxious about my personal safety”, said one textile company operative, Yoon Sang-Young.

The South’s Unification Ministry said about 130 South Koreans had planned to enter Kaesong on Thursday to begin shutdown work and that almost 70 who had been staying there would be departing. “Our government has been quite inflexible in dealing with North Korea”, said Professor Moon. The report didn’t elaborate on what that meant.

Tensions between the two Koreas has been high following Pyongyang’s nuclear test last month and its launching of a satellite on Sunday.

The North Korea army is taking control of the Gaeseong industrial complex and freezing the assets of the more than 120 South Korean companies operating there, the official Korean Central News Agency reported on Thursday.

The statement launched a series of crude insults at the South Korean president, accusing her of “inveterate sycophancy” and “confrontational hysteria” at the behest of American “prodding”.

A source familiar with North Korean affairs also told Reuters that Ri had been executed.

“We must take strong action to curb North Korea’s nuclear program and address the other threats that it poses to the USA and our allies”.

Defending its decision to halt operations at Kaesong, Seoul said North Korea had been using the hundreds of millions of dollars in hard-currency that it earned from the complex to fund its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes.

The project that combined cheap North Korean labor with the capital and technology of affluent South Korea has always been viewed both as a test of the potential for reunification of a peninsula divided by the 1950-53 Korean War and a symbol of intractable tension. Please see our terms of service for more information.

China, North Korea’s most important ally, as well as Russian Federation have signed up to UN Security Council sanctions over the missile and nuclear tests.