By Jung Sung-ki
Opposition political parties agreed Wednesday to cooperate on measures to stem the spread of foot-and-mouth disease across the nation, putting political fighting against the ruling party aside for the time being.
The agreement was made at a National Assembly meeting between the leaders of the opposition parties. Participants included Park Jie-won, floor leader of the main opposition Democratic Party (DP), Kwon Young-ghil, floor leader of the Democratic Labor Party, Lee Yong-kyung, floor leader of the Create Korea Party, and Kim Jeong-jin, vice chairman of the New Progressive Party.
The agreement followed a call by Rep. Ahn Sang-soo, chairman of the ruling Grand National Party (GNP), for opposition parties to stop political wrangling and sit down together to discuss measures to contain the disease.
The opposition leaders are calling on the government to declare national disaster areas, as the country is suffering its worst-ever outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. The highly contagious virus has been spreading fast to farms across the country despite a nationwide quarantine effort.
They also agreed to cooperate in passing a domestic animal infectious disease control law at the Assembly’s agricultural and food committee Friday.
GNP floor leader Rep. Kim Moo-sung said, however, he believes declaring national disaster areas would not be so feasible because a relevant law for compensating farmers hit by the infectious animal diseases is already in place.
Investigators detected the latest outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in the country Nov. 28 on a pig farm in the southern city of Andong. The disease has since spread to areas around Seoul.
Foot-and-mouth disease is known to be a highly communicable disease that affects cattle, swine, sheep, goats, deer and other cloven-hoofed animals.