SKorea: NKorea requests for shipment of rice, cement and heavy equipment for flood recovery

SKorea: NKorea asks for flood aid despite tension

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea requested a shipment of rice, cement and heavy equipment days after rival South Korea offered relief aid to its communist neighbor to help it recover from recent flooding, the South’s Unification Ministry said Tuesday.

Word of the communication between the two Koreas on aid came a day after the North announced it would release the crew of a seized South Korean fishing boat, in a sign that the divided countries may be talking behind the scenes in what could lead to a resumption of formal talks.

An overflowing river last month swamped farmland, houses and public buildings in the North’s northwestern city of Sinuiju and adjacent areas. State media reported that the region was “severely affected” by the flooding, though details of the damage remain unknown. North Korea observers fear the flooding has worsened the country’s chronic food shortages.

Last week, South Korea’s Red Cross sent a message to its North Korean counterpart and proposed sending medicines, daily necessities and emergency food worth 10 billion won ($8.5 million).

The North’s Red Cross replied on Saturday that it would prefer rice, cement and heavy equipment — items it said were necessary for flood recovery efforts, according to Seoul’s Unification Ministry and Red Cross.

South Korea was reviewing the North’s request, the Unification Ministry said in a statement Tuesday. North Korea’s secretive communist regime has not confirmed making the request and its state-run media have not mentioned it.

Red Cross official Kim Sung-keun said the bulk of the aid, if sent, would be financed by the South Korean government.

The aid offer came despite continuing tension over March’s deadly sinking of a South Korean warship blamed on Pyongyang, an attack that the North flatly denies. In retaliation, South Korea cut off nearly all trade with North Korea but has continued shipping humanitarian aid for the vulnerable, including infants and pregnant women.

On Monday, North Korea also announced it would free a seven-man crew of a South Korean fishing boat seized a month ago in its waters, calling it a “humanitarian” gesture.

An analyst said the North is believed to have decided to release the fishermen in return for South Korea’s aid offer.

“I believe this is the results of informal contacts between the two Koreas,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the Seoul-based University of North Korean Studies. The latest development may foster a “positive atmosphere” for the resumption of formal talks between the two Koreas, he said.

The four South Korean and three Chinese fisherman and their vessel would be repatriated to the South at the Koreas’ eastern sea border on Tuesday afternoon, officials said. They were taken into custody on Aug. 8, accused of fishing illegally in North Korea’s exclusive economic zone off the east coast of the divided Korean peninsula.

A South Korean newspaper, meanwhile, ran still photos Tuesday from video taken in the flood-hit Sinuiju, which shows people staying in tents and waiting in lines to buy water. The paper said the video was taken by an unidentified source in the North but has not posted the video on its website.

The Chosun Ilbo newspaper cited the source as saying that North Korean residents were aware of the South Korean aid offer and were complaining bitterly of leader Kim Jong Il not accepting the assistance quickly.

North Korea has relied on foreign food aid since natural disasters and mismanagement devastated its economy in the mid-1990s and led to a famine estimated to have killed as many as 2 million people.