By Do Je-hae
After North Korea denied its involvement in landmine explosions in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), unfounded rumors are circulating on the Internet.
One even suggests that South Korea is using the incident to pressure the North even though it knows that the explosions have nothing to do with Pyongyang.
These rumors are already hot debate topics on the nation’s major Internet portals, such as Daum and Naver, as well as social networking sites.
The conspiracy theories resemble those that circulated around the Internet after North Korea denied any involvement in the 2010 sinking of the Navy corvette Cheonan that killed 46 South Korean sailors. North Korea still claims it had nothing to do with the Cheonan incident.
On Daum’s Agora, an online platform for debating current events, a user identified as ‘go***’ wrote a lengthy post that refuted the Ministry of Defense's finding that North Korea masterminded the landmine explosion, severely injuring two Korean soldiers on Aug. 4.
“The ministry's video showing the explosion site triggers many questions,” the post read. “It looks as though the soldiers were carrying out a pre-determined scenario. It seems that the National Security Council decided after Aug. 4 to announce South Korean landmines that were washed away from another area as North Korea's wooden land mines.”
Another user ‘kokk****’ said that the explosion seemed to be a set-up by the National Intelligence Service (NIS) and the ruling camp to divert the public’s attention from some troubling events, including a hacking scandal at the NIS that led to an apparent suicide of one of its agents.
“There is no video evidence of North Koreans actually planting the landmines. Such a video cannot exist because it is not the North Koreans’ doing.”
“This is an event that the NIS and the Saenuri Party concocted to cover up the illegal hacking scandal, and the military and the media have joined the fabrication."
The spread of online rumors has caught the attention of the ruling Saenuri Party.
“I am appalled by such rumors,” Saenuri Party floor leader Rep. Won Yoo-chul said during a Supreme Council meeting Monday. “They are an affront to the injured soldiers. The people will never allow such rumors.”
The Ministry of Defense said Sunday that sympathizing with such rumors is to comply with North Korea's intention to trigger internal conflict. It reiterated that the explosion was a result of “an obvious military provocation by North Korea.”
Unlike the Cheonan sinking, North Korea waited a few days to issue a statement refuting South Korea’s conclusion that the mine blast was masterminded by Pyongyang.
The ministry’s belated announcement of the explosion has fueled some netizens’ distrust in the outcome of its probe, which said that North Korean mines had been planted in the South-controlled part of the DMZ in the last week of July.
The ministry briefed the media on the explosion a week after it took place.
A day before Aug. 15 Liberation Day, North’s National Defense Commission called on South Korea to provide solid evidence to support its claim against North Korea. “We demand South Korea provide video evidence. If there is no video, the South should never mention the North’s provocation.”