NK blasts request to scrap Geneva Agreement

Amid a renewed campaign of anti-U.S. rhetoric that began on Mar. 14, North Korea`s Central Broadcasting Station denounced Washington Saturday for a request by Sen. Jesse Helms to scrap the Geneva Agreement that authorized the North to operate nuclear reactors.

The state-run news agency said the request by the Foreign Relations Committee chairman was tantamount to declaring an all-out nuclear confrontation with North Korea.

Citing delays in the construction of the light-water reactors, Radio Pyongyang claimed said ``the U.S. should compensate us for the damage we are now suffering because it has failed to implement the basic agreement between North Korea and the U.S.``

Quoting a report by the Bureau of Secretariat of the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland, the Central Broadcasting Station also said that the U.S. should apologize for the crimes it committed during the Korean War, offer compensation and refrain from intervening in the unification issue on the Korean peninsula.

Referring to recent South Korean press reports that the remains of about 2,000 people massacred during the Korean War were excavated at a mine in Kyongsan, North Kyongsang Province, the bureau said, ``This is further evidence of the brutal killings of innocent people by the U.S. imperialists during the war.``

Ha Tae-Won scooop@donga.com