SEOUL - North Korea's military said Feb. 10 it would no longer engage in dialogue with South Korea's armed forces following the breakdown of talks the previous day.
The military delegation to those talks, in a statement on the North's official news agency, said the South's armed forces were only interested in maintaining high tension on the peninsula.
Two days of colonel-level talks at the border village of Panmunjom, designed to make arrangements for a high-level military meeting, broke down Feb. 9 when the North's team walked out.
The two sides had been meeting for the first time since the North's deadly shelling of a South Korean island on Nov. 23.
The South says there must be an apology at future talks for the shelling, and for the sinking of a warship last March that Seoul also blames on Pyongyang.
Four people including two civilians died in the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island near the disputed Yellow Sea border. The sinking of the warship, in which the North denies involvement, cost 46 lives.
The North says its attack on Yeonpyeong was in response to a South Korean live-fire drill there, which dropped shells into waters claimed by the North.
It says future talks should focus not on the incidents but on general ways to avoid provocations by either side.
The military delegation to those talks, in a statement on the North's official news agency, said the South's armed forces were only interested in maintaining high tension on the peninsula.
Two days of colonel-level talks at the border village of Panmunjom, designed to make arrangements for a high-level military meeting, broke down Feb. 9 when the North's team walked out.
The two sides had been meeting for the first time since the North's deadly shelling of a South Korean island on Nov. 23.
The South says there must be an apology at future talks for the shelling, and for the sinking of a warship last March that Seoul also blames on Pyongyang.
Four people including two civilians died in the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island near the disputed Yellow Sea border. The sinking of the warship, in which the North denies involvement, cost 46 lives.
The North says its attack on Yeonpyeong was in response to a South Korean live-fire drill there, which dropped shells into waters claimed by the North.
It says future talks should focus not on the incidents but on general ways to avoid provocations by either side.
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