The country's conservative opposition is raising the heat on the Lee Jae Myung administration’s security and diplomatic policies as inter-Korean tensions continue to escalate.
“North Korea’s last line of defense is not land mines nor nuclear weapons. The weapon of last defense North Korea has hidden is President Lee,” People Power Party Chair Rep. Jang Dong-hyeok said Thursday, honing in on President Lee Jae Myung’s earlier remarks on North Korean nuclear weapons.
During a meeting with the press earlier this week, Lee said that North Korea’s nuclear arsenal should be considered more of a last line of defense than weapons the North will actively use in an offensive.
Jang also pointed to recent issues with US Forces Korea Commander Gen. Xavier Brunson and claimed that the current administration was breaking away from the democratic bloc, adding that the emphasis Lee places on self-reliant defense is “the same as anti-US, pro-North Korea, pro-China.”
Jang’s attack on Lee’s security policies came as North Korea declared that anti-South propaganda broadcasts will resume, and that additional strike capabilities will be deployed along the border.
"It is no secret that North Korea intends to exploit the Lee administration’s indifference to national security to complete the fortification of its borders and push for the redeployment of tactical nuclear weapons," Rep. Choi Bo-yun of the People Power Party said in a statement Thursday, demanding that Seoul also resume its loudspeaker broadcasts.
Rep. Choi Eun-seok of the People Power Party issued a separate statement Thursday, saying, "While the North Korean leadership stands at the front line with guns pointed our way, what is the president of South Korea doing? ... We must first set aside our outdated ideological inertia and our illusions about North Korea."
The conservative party, which has long taken a hard-line stance toward the North, has been critical of Lee and his government ministers' remarks about North Korea.
Unification Minister Chung Dong-young's remarks in early October, when he said that it is difficult to determine whether North Korea deliberately planned the land mine explosions in the Demilitarized Zone that injured three South Korean soldiers last month, became the source of criticism from conservatives.
The main opposition party's leaders have stepped up the game to ideological warfare.
"North Korea’s nuclear arsenal poses a massive threat to South Korea’s security. But the even more grave threat is the administration's pro-North Korea ideology," Rep. Jeong Jeom-sig, floor leader of the People Power Party, wrote on Facebook Thursday.
Meanwhile, conservatives are also increasing the pressure over Korea's deteriorating relations with Kyiv.
Rep. Na Kyung-won and dozens of other People Power Party lawmakers floated a resolution on Thursday to urge Seoul to protect two North Korean POWs sent from Ukraine to Seoul, and to normalize relations with Ukraine.
An expert noted that such a partisan political battle is far from helpful.
"It is true that the government has been struggling to sternly deal with North Korea, but that doesn’t mean we should engage in a war," Lee Jae-mook, professor of political science at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, told The Korea Herald.
"Instead of turning this into a bitter partisan political battle, we should be working together to find a wise solution," he said. "In the end, we can't just keep escalating tensions and expect things to work out."
Professor Lee also called for government transparency and fair compensation for those who have suffered from North Korean provocations, in order not to feed public distrust toward the administration's national security policy.
consnow@heraldcorp.com