By Park Sung-hee
The government is on a crash course with civic organizations as the latter are poised to press for plans to provide food assistance to the poverty-stricken North Korea.
The government has condemned non-governmental organizations (NGOs) for having been assisting North Korea despite the administration’s ban on food aid for it, calling it “a breaking of the law.”
“Though the law does not specifically state this, aid given to a third party is also a violation of the intentions of the law,” said Lee Jong-joo, a spokeswoman of the Ministry of Unification. “Even actions by NGOs must abide by state law.”
But the vague wording of the particular regulation is creating confusion among organizations that seek to fulfill their mission of helping the impoverished country.
“We have no intentions of breaking any law, domestic or international, but I myself am quite confused and there seems to be a lack of unified government stance on this issue,” said Lee Chang-hwee, senior official of the National Council of Churches (NCCK).
The NCCK delivered 172 tons of food on May 18, through a Chinese Christian organization, Amity Foundation, and plans to provide another 170 tons of flour (100 million won worth) by the end of this month or the beginning of August.
Many organizations alike are frustrated at the lack of timeliness or efforts by the government to ease the severe food situation in the North which is perhaps the reason that NGOs are looking to third parties.
Since 2008, contact between Seoul and Pyeongyang has been minimal as President Lee Myung-bak made aid conditional to the agreement that the North dismantles its nuclear weapons program. Relations were further strained after the government banned most humanitarian aid to North Korea after the South presented forensic evidence that a North Korean torpedo struck the South Korean warship Cheonan on March 2010, and the deadly shelling of Yeonpyeong Island by Pyongyang in November 2010.
Despite requests to increase assistance the administration remains unmoved. “We do not entirely ban aid towards North Korea, but the individual proposals made will be under close examination, though we cannot determine by when a decision will be made,” said an official from the Ministry of Unification which reviews requests by private-sectors one by one.
Nevertheless, as groups outside the Korean Peninsula such as the European Union are pressing forth the severity of North Korea’s food status, the position of South Korea is the center of attention.
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