SEOUL: South Korea plans to suspend a military agreement signed with North Korea in 2018 aimed at easing tensions, the presidential office said on Monday, after Seoul warned of a strong response to balloons launched by Pyongyang carrying trash to the South.
North Korea has launched hundreds balloons carried by wind across the border that dropped trash throughout South Korea, which called it a provocation and rejected Pyongyang’s claim it was done to inconvenience its neighbor.
The National Security Council said it would raise the plan to suspend the entirety of the military agreement for approval by the cabinet at a meeting on Tuesday.
Suspending the agreement will pave the way for the South to conduct training near the military border and take “sufficient and immediate measures” in response to North Korea’s provocation, the Council said in a statement.
It did not elaborate what those measures may be.
The pact, which was the most substantive deal to come out months of historic summit meetings between the two Koreas in 2018, had been all but scrapped when Pyongyang declared last year it was no longer bound by it.
Since then, the North deployed troops and weapons at guard posts near the military border.
By continuing to comply with the pact, “there have been considerable problems in our military’s readiness posture,” the Council said.
South Korea has previously said it would take “unendurable” measures against North Korea for sending the trash balloons over the border, which could include blaring propaganda from loudspeakers positioned at the border directed at the North.
North Korea has said the balloons were in retaliation for a propaganda campaign by North Korean defectors and activists in the South, who regularly send inflatables containing anti-Pyongyang leaflets with food, medicine, money and USB sticks loaded with K-pop music videos and dramas across the border.
North Korea has reacted angrily to the campaign because it is worried about the potential impact of the materials on the psychology of the people who read or listen to them and on the state’s control of the public, experts said.
South Korea to suspend military pact with North over trash balloons
https://arab.news/6excz
South Korea to suspend military pact with North over trash balloons
- Suspending the agreement will pave the way for the South to conduct training near the military border
- The pact had been all but scrapped when Pyongyang declared last year it was no longer bound by it
UK court jails Christian camp leader for drugging, sexually abusing boys
- Ruben admitted offenses relating to ill-treatment of children and sexual abuse — as well as to drugging his wife, who was volunteering at the camp, in order to avoid detection
LONDON: A court in England on Friday jailed a man for more than 31 years for drugging and sexually abusing young boys at a Christian summer camp he led last summer.
Police say they are now talking to other groups he worked with in the past as part of an ongoing investigation.
Former vet Jon Ruben, 76, was leading the camp last July, said a statement from prosecutors released after Friday’s judgment.
He laced sweets with sedatives and tricked children at the camp into eating them by encouraging them to take part in a game.
“Later on, while the boys were heavily asleep, he went into their dormitory and chose individual boys to sexually abuse them,” said prosecutors.
Volunteers at the camp in Leicestershire, central England, raised the alarm after finding the children still nauseous, drowsy and disoriented the next day.
Eight boys aged between eight and 11 were taken to hospital and Ruben was arrested.
Investigators found syringes and sedatives at the camp location.
On his devices they found indecent images of children as well as evidence he had procured tranquilizer drugs and tried to join an online paedophile network.
Ruben admitted offenses relating to ill-treatment of children and sexual abuse — as well as to drugging his wife, who was volunteering at the camp, in order to avoid detection.
A court in Leicester sentenced him on Friday to a total of 31 years and 10 months behind bars under special provisions for defendants designated by prosecutors as particularly dangerous.
Leicestershire police said the investigation into Ruben was still “very much ongoing.”
Officers are contacting schools and youth organizations in central England with whom Ruben was involved with over the past two decades.
