Unification Texts List N. Korean Provocations

North Korea’s provocations and terrorist attacks against South Korea have been included in the South`s unification education materials for the first time.

This move comes amid heightened calls for the reinforcement of the public’s sense of national security in the face of mounting evidence that a North Korean torpedo sank the South Korean naval patrol ship Cheonan.

The Korea Institute for National Unification under the ministry introduced Monday a clause on “inter-Korean relations vis-a-vis conflict and tension” in Chapter 4.2 titled “The Development of Inter-Korean Relations” in this year`s edition of the unification educational material, “Understanding of the Unification Issue.”

The institute described 10 of the North’s major provocations with the clause, “The trigger behind inter-Korean conflict has been mostly led by the North’s offensive strategy against the South along with the Korean War in 1950.”

The 10 provocations are: the detention of Hyundai Asan Corp. employees last year; the killing of a South Korean tourist in Mount Kumgang in 2008; nuclear tests in 2002 and last year; the Daecheong naval battle last year and two battles near Yeonpyeong Island in 1999 and 2002; the submarine infiltration in Gangneung, Gangwon Province in 1996; the bombing of a Korean Air flight in 1987; the Aung San bombing in Burma in 1983; the hacking murders of four American servicemen in Panmunjom in 1976; armed infiltration into Uljin and Samcheok in 1968; and the raid on the South Korean presidential office in 1968.

“Previous materials covered only inter-Korean dialogue and negotiations,” said a South Korean government source. “We tried to show that two aspects coexist in inter-Korean relations. One is for us to reconcile and cooperate as one people and the other is to consider the North an enemy state that we have fought.”

kyle@donga.com