North Korea has scrapped several government bodies tasked with promoting reconciliation and reunification with South Korea as authoritarian leader Kim Jong Un warned that his secretive country does not seek to avoid war.
The Supreme People’s Assembly, Kim says unification with South Korea is no longer possible and called for a constitutional amendment to change the status of South Korea to a separate, hostile country.
The Supreme People’s Assembly says that three organisations handling inter-Korean reconciliation – the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Country, the National Economic Cooperation Bureau and the (Mount Kumgang) International Tourism Administration – will shut.
The decision marks a further deterioration in relations between the Koreas following a series of recent missile tests by Pyongyang.