<View of Foreign Press>
North Korea Is Suspected
By Kim Na-yeon, Guest Reporter
From April 27th, five-day Navy funeral had been held in Pyeongtaek. Not only families of the deceased sailors but also the nations are paying homage to the 46 sailors who died in the naval ship Cheonan. As the country is soaked with sorrow, there is much more attention towards the cause of the incident. The military tries to secure proof of substantiating its tentative conclusion that a “non-contact underwater blast” shattered the Navy corvette. Defense Minister Kim Tae-young said that he thinks a “bubble jet impact”--caused by a mid-sized torpedo with a warhead weighing more than 200 kilograms -- is most likely to have caused the 1,200-ton ship to be torn into two. And this statement also caught foreign press’s attention.
CNN, the U.S. Cable News Network reported a North Korean torpedo attack was the most likely cause for the sinking of a South Korean warship last month, according to a US military official. They quoted official’s saying that the US believes the ship was sunk by the blast of an underwater explosion, but the explosive device itself did not come in contact with the hull of the South Korean ship. They pointed out this is the same conclusion which was expressed by Korean military officials.
AFP, Agence France-Presse cited Defense minister’s saying that a torpedo attack is among the ‘most likely’ causes of the sinking. Besides they reported South Korea will try to see whether Kim muong-guk, North Korea's head of general staff operations bureau, had been rewarded for the ship's sinking. Actually Kim was demoted to a three-star general in a previous move, but appears to have regained his former four-star rank. North Korea has accused the South's "war maniacs" of seeking to blame it for the tragedy. It also mentioned the ties between the two Koreas appeared be suffered several setbacks since Lee's government took power in 2008.
BBC News, a department of the British Broadcasting Corporation, delivered that South Korean president has marked the "lofty sacrifice" of 46 South Korean sailors who died when war ship mysteriously sank last month. They brought up South Korea is now reportedly investigating whether a demoted North Korean general has won back his former rank as a reward of the sinking the vessel. Furthermore they told that Seoul has also launched an investigation into its own response to the disaster, after questions were raised about the speed of the rescue operation. And finally it mentioned that "full-scale audit" of the official response to the disaster will be launched immediately after the sailor's funeral.
It has already been one month since the Cheonan sank near the western sea border with North Korea on March 26, after an explosion, which split the vessel in half. Among 104 crews, only fifty-eight seamen were rescued and forty others have been lost. When the incident was broken, the government took careful position to doubt North Korea. Nevertheless, the opinion is gathered into pointing the North, as the suspect relating to the suspicious promotion of Kim Myong-guk. And undoubtedly, the tension between the North and south is expected to grow more.
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