South Korea calls for stronger US ties as troops face withdrawal

SOUTH KOREAN President Roh Moo-hyun yesterday called for a stronger alliance with the United States but said the nation must be prepared for a possible redeployment of US troops in the country.

North Korea yesterday said US reluctance to engage in face-to-face talks about its nuclear ambitions may make a clash inevitable on the world’s last Cold War front, after test-firing a missile that rattled nerves in South Korea.

And as tension mounted on the Korean peninsula and the US prepared for a possible invasion of Iraq, Washington protested to Pyongyang on Monday over a March 2 incident in which North Korean fighter jets intercepted a US spy plane.

Speaking to the graduating class of the Korea Military Academy a day after North Korea fired a cruise missile into the Sea of Japan, Mr Roh said the redeployment plan was not new.

But he stressed the half-century alliance between Seoul and Washington should be maintained now more than ever.

“The staunch Korea-US combined defence arrangement is greatly contributing to our national security. The solid (South Korea-US) alliance should be maintained even more so,” he declared. “There can be no change whatsoever in that principle.”

Mr Roh’s comments came after US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said last week troops could be pulled back from near the border with North Korea or be withdrawn from South Korea altogether.

The US has 37,000 troops in the South and act as a “tripwire” to deter North Korean aggression.

Meanwhile, warning that its clinics in North Korea will run out of medicines next month, the UN children’s agency issued an urgent appeal yesterday for donations, asking countries to set aside any unease about helping the North during the crisis over its nuclear program and missile tests.

UNICEF has received less than $500,000 of the $12 million it needs this year to buy medicines, high-energy milk and supplies for 2.5 million North Korean children, said Mehr Khan, its Asia-Pacific director.

She said more than half of that came from Norway, while many other previous donors have given nothing.

Without new donations, UNICEF clinics will run out of medicine next month and other supplies in coming months, Khan said.

“Unless urgent assistance is provided we could see malnutrition rates go up,” Ms Khan said at a news conference after returning from a week-long visit to the North.

Ms Khan said she didn’t know why giving has fallen off.

But asked whether it could be linked to tensions over the North’s nuclear program and missile tests that have unsettled its neighbours, she said that was a possibility and appealed for donors to set aside any such unease in order to help the isolated country’s children.

“It might be the political uncertainty ... and people are holding back donations,” she said. “But with humanitarian assistance, we cannot wait. The children cannot wait.”