SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea on Tuesday blew up a building set up in 2018 in a border town as a joint liaison office to foster better ties with South Korea after threatening action if North Korean defectors went ahead with a campaign sending propaganda leaflets into the North.
The liaison office in Kaesong – a gleaming blue-glass four-storey structure in an otherwise drab industrial city – was “ruined with a terrific explosion,” North Korea’s state news agency KCNA said.
The destruction of the building, which had been closed since January due to the coronavirus fears, was a major setback to efforts by South Korean President Moon Jae-in to coax North Korea into cooperation. It also appeared to be a further blow to U.S. President Donald Trump’s hopes of persuading North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and open up to the outside world.
Surveillance video released by South Korea’s defence ministry showed a large explosion that appeared to bring down the building. The explosion also appeared to cause a partial collapse of a neighbouring 15-storey high-rise building that had served as a residential facility for South Korean officials who staffed the liaison office.
When the office was closed in January, South Korea said it had 58 personnel stationed there.
“We are aware that North Korea destroyed the liaison office in Kaesong and remain in close coordination with our Republic of Korea allies,” a senior Trump administration official said.
The U.S. State Department did not immediately comment, but announced that Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun,