JH Ahn
The United Nations Command (UNC) has decided not to publicly share the result of its investigation into North Korea’s artillery provocation to South in August.
However, a progressive South Korean newspaper and an opposition lawmaker criticized the UNC’s decision, demanding that the information be disclosed to public. this case is finished and both South Korea and U.S. have agreed not to make the result public,” Kim Min-seok, spokesperson for Ministry of National Defense (MND), said during a Monday briefing.South Korean opposition party lawmaker Kim Kwang-jin argued that the findings from the UNC’s investigation must be disclosed publicly.
Kim further questioned whether Seoul had pushed the UNC to keep the result from being disclosed as “the first findings from the United Nations Command Military Armistice Commission (UNCMAC) were not so favorable toward the South Korean government’s expectations.”
South Korea’s Kyunghyang Sinmun also slammed both the U.S. and South Korean military’s decision to keep the case closed.
“The UNC and South Korea’s Joint Chief of Staffs are suffering public discredit, as they have partially amended the results of their findings more favorably toward the South Korean military.”
However, the UNC spokesperson told NK News that the results were kept closed as some of the findings had to do with intelligence related to the North Korean military.
“The UNC has its own strategic goals to achieve, and we are not obligated to share our strategic information to the public every time we conduct investigations,” said the spokesperson.
“Strategically speaking, we have no reason to make the result public as the findings were related to the North Korean military.”
The spokesperson also noted that the UNCMAC’s first findings could’ve been different from those of the South Korean investigation team as the two parties were approaching the case from different methods and angles.
“The South Korean military was investigating (North Korea’s shelling of South Korea) with what the front-line soldiers had heard and seen amid the incident, while the UNCMAC’s investigation team was focusing on finding North Korea’s violation of armistice itself,” said the spokesperson.
“The result can come out differently as two investigations teams had different points of view on the issue.”
