South Korean President Lee Myung-bak on Thursday convened an emergency meeting after the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) expelled South Korean officials from an inter-Korean industrial complex in DPRK, Lee's spokesman said.
The meeting came after the DPRK side demanded all South Korean government officials to leave from their office in DPRK's Kaesong inter-Korean industrial complex early on the day.
Senior Presidential Secretary for Foreign Affairs and National Security Kim Byung-kook and Unification Minister Kim Ha-joong met separately with the president after the president held an emergency meeting with security-related government officials to discuss the situation, said Presidential spokesman Lee Dong-kwan.
Local analysts said DPRK's expulsion of South Korean officials from the Kaesong industrial complex, which is a symbolic inter-Korean economic cooperation program, was apparent a reaction against Lee Myung-bak's hardline policy against Pyongyang.
The spokesman described the expulsion as "regrettable" and said it "may pose an obstacle to sustained development of inter-Korean relations."
The South Korean government will deal with the Kaesong incident in accordance with its pragmatic policy while adopting a flexible approach, the spokesman said.
There are 69 South Korean companies operating at the Kaesong inter-Korean industrial complex. A total of 23,953 DPRK workers are employed by those companies, according to the South Korean government said.
South Korea's Yonhap News Agency reported on Thursday that South Korean companies at the industrial complex still operate normally after the pullout of South Korean government officials.
Source:Xinhua
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