North Korean leader Kim Jong-un stressed that his country's participation in the Asian Games in South Korea would help improve cross-border relations, the North's state media reported Sunday, just days after negotiations fell through on Pyongyang's dispatch of its delegation.
"The participation of the DPRK's players in the 17th Asian Games offers an important occasion in improving the relations between the north and the south and removing distrust between them," the North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) quoted Kim as saying in an English-language report. DPRK stands for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, North Korea's official name.
The comments were made when Kim watched a match of the North Korean men's national football team which plans to participate in the Incheon Asian Games, the KCNA report monitored in Seoul said.
The games are scheduled for Sept. 19-Oct. 4 in South Korea's western port city of Incheon.
"It is our principled stand that the inviolable sports should not be a political bargaining chip of the undesirable forces," the young leader added.
On Thursday, North Korea walked out of the talks with South Korea on details to Pyongyang's dispatch of a delegation to the Asiad. It has since been spewing criticisms against Seoul, accusing it of deliterately scuttling the North's participation in the event.
The working-level talks ended without being able to agree on a date for the next meeting. No clear reason was given for the unexpected development, but the apparent deal breaker was who should foot the bill for the large North Korean delegation's stay in South Korea.
Among those who accompanied Kim to the football match were Hwang Pyong-so, the military's top political officer, and Choe Ryong-hae and Kim Yang-gon, governing party secretaries, according to the KCNA report. (Yonhap)
"The participation of the DPRK's players in the 17th Asian Games offers an important occasion in improving the relations between the north and the south and removing distrust between them," the North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) quoted Kim as saying in an English-language report. DPRK stands for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, North Korea's official name.
The comments were made when Kim watched a match of the North Korean men's national football team which plans to participate in the Incheon Asian Games, the KCNA report monitored in Seoul said.
The games are scheduled for Sept. 19-Oct. 4 in South Korea's western port city of Incheon.
"It is our principled stand that the inviolable sports should not be a political bargaining chip of the undesirable forces," the young leader added.
On Thursday, North Korea walked out of the talks with South Korea on details to Pyongyang's dispatch of a delegation to the Asiad. It has since been spewing criticisms against Seoul, accusing it of deliterately scuttling the North's participation in the event.
The working-level talks ended without being able to agree on a date for the next meeting. No clear reason was given for the unexpected development, but the apparent deal breaker was who should foot the bill for the large North Korean delegation's stay in South Korea.
Among those who accompanied Kim to the football match were Hwang Pyong-so, the military's top political officer, and Choe Ryong-hae and Kim Yang-gon, governing party secretaries, according to the KCNA report. (Yonhap)
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