Screaming crowds greet Kim on frontline
2013-03-08 16:02
Seoul - North Korean television broadcast emotional
scenes on Friday of cheering soldiers and their young families greeting leader
Kim Jong-Un as he visited a frontline unit that shelled the South in 2010.
With tensions surging on the Korean peninsula, Kim said
the North's military was "fully ready to fight a Korean style all-out
war," as he visited two islands close to the disputed maritime border on
Thursday, state media said.
Footage of the visit showed him being greeted by chanting
troops who were held back as they surged towards him.
Their families brought their children to meet him, with
one woman encouraging her daughter forward for a hug.
At the end of the trip, the soldiers ran down to the
beach and waded chest deep into the freezing water clutching at Kim's motor
launch as it moved away.
The tour coincided with an outpouring of vitriol from
Pyongyang over UN sanctions imposed for its nuclear test last month, with the
North threatening pre-emptive nuclear strikes on the US and its allies, and
vowing to rip up peace pacts with South Korea.
Speaking to troops stationed on the islands, Kim said the
slightest provocation would result in his immediate order for a "great
advance" along the entire frontline with the South, the Korean Central
News Agency (KCNA) said.
On Mu island he inspected artillery units that shelled
the nearby South Korean island of Yeonpyeong in November 2010, killing four
people and triggering an exchange of fire that sparked fears of a full-blown
conflict.
State television showed Kim inspecting the craters left
by South artillery shells on the island in what he described as the "most
gratifying" battle since the end of the Korean War in 1953.
The television footage showed him with binoculars looking
across at Yeonpyeong Island and apparently discussing target selection with the
artillery officers.
"He reconfirmed in detail reinforced fire power
strike means and targets of the enemy deployed on five islets," including
Yeonpyeong island and "defined the order of precision strikes" on
those targets, KCNA said.
Kim was accompanied on his tour by top members of the
North Korean leadership, including political commissar Choe Ryong-Hae and
Defence Minister Kim Kyok-Sik.
