RELATIONS ON the Korean Peninsula have been plunged back into the worst days of the Cold War following the publication of a report blaming Pyongyang for sinking a South Korean gunship.
A team of international investigators said wreckage recovered from the site of the March 26th incident proved that a North Korean torpedo had sunk the 1200-tonne Cheonan frigate, killing 46 South Korean sailors.
South Korean president Lee Myung-bak, who earlier this month chaired the country’s first ever joint meeting of his top military commanders, has threatened “stern action” if allegations of North Korean involvement prove true.
Last night he said the inquiry was “clear and definitive material evidence” that Pyongyang was behind the attack.
North Korea immediately branded the report a “fabrication” and threatened war if retaliatory measures were taken.
Officials in the Seoul government say evidence recovered from the attack near the disputed sea border between North and South Korea includes a pair of propellers, a propulsion shaft and four rudders of a torpedo, probably modelled on a Chinese-made weapon.
Distinctive serial numbers also matched a similar North Korean torpedo recovered by the South Korean military seven years ago.
The team of investigators from the US, Britain, Australia and Sweden concluded that there was no “other plausible explanation” for what they found.
“The evidence points overwhelmingly to the conclusion that the torpedo was fired by a North Korean submarine.”
Governments across the world were quick to back the report’s claims. Washington called the attack “an act of aggression”, just ahead of a week-long trip to the region by secretary of state Hillary Clinton.
Mrs Clinton’s visit to South Korea, China and Japan is almost certain to raise the political temperature on the Korean Peninsula, which has been one of the world’s key flash points since the two sides fought each other to a stalemate in the 1950-1953 Korean War.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the incident “only deepens North Korea’s isolation”.
But China, which remains the only major ally of the Stalinist state, urged “calm” until it finished its own “scientific” investigation of the attack.
Beijing will now come under growing pressure to line up with Washington and its allies in crafting a response.
Chinese vice-foreign minister Cui Tiankai called the sinking of the vessel “unfortunate”, but declined to draw any conclusions from the report, a response that immediately came under fire in the South Korean press.
The attack on the frigate, which the south’s military leaders say was in revenge for an earlier naval firefight near the disputed border, has dominated southern politics since March, with much soulsearching on the nation’s security failings.
Yesterday the main opposition Democratic Party called on President Kim’s cabinet to resign “en masse” to take responsibility for failing to protect the country and its citizens.
North Korea responded to the report in typically full-blooded style, saying that its “army and people will promptly react to any ‘punishment’ and ‘retaliation’ and to any ‘sanctions’ infringing upon our state interests with various forms of tough measures including an all-out war”.