South Korean Minister of Unification Will Step Down

South Korea’s Unification Minister, the liaison for relations with North Korea, resigned on Friday due to mounting tensions in the peninsula.

 

The move comes a few days after Pyongyang blew up his liaison office with its southern neighbours.

The following day, North Korea threatened to strengthen its military presence in and around the demilitarized zone.

President Moon Jae-in “accepted the proposal of Unification Minister Kim Yeon-chul to resign,” the presidential office said in a statement, without providing further details.

Kim had already offered to resign on Wednesday, a day after the liaison office was demolished, saying that he “took responsibility” for the deterioration in inter-Korean relations.

Since early June, North Korea has viciously vexed the South several times over anti-Pyongyang leaflets distributed by defectors.

Usually these are attached to balloons or thrown into the water in bottles.