The chief of South Korea's Hyundai Group has withdrawn an application to visit North Korea's Mount Kumgang, after the North said it has "no intention to examine" the application, an official at Seoul's unification ministry said Monday.
Hyun Jeong-eun, chairwoman of Hyundai Group, which had run sightseeing programs at the North Korean mountain, had been seeking to visit the North in August to mark the 20th anniversary of the death of her husband and former chairman of the group, Chung Mong-hun.
Last Saturday, North Korea rejected Hyun's bid to visit Mount Kumgang, saying that Pyongyang has the policy of not permitting the entry of South Korean nationals into its territory.
"We make it clear that we have neither been informed about any South Korean personage's willingness for visit nor known about it and that we have no intention to examine it," Kim Song-il, a director general of the North's foreign ministry, was quoted as saying by state media.
Koo Byoung-sam, spokesperson for the unification ministry, speaks during a regular press briefing at the government complex in Seoul on July 3, 2023. (Yonhap)
Hyundai Asan, a subsidiary of Hyundai Group that had operated businesses in North Korea, told the Ministry of Unification that it has withdrawn the application to visit Mount Kumgang, Koo Byoung-sam, a ministry spokesperson, told reporters.
"The government will accept it later in the day," Koo said.
The North's swift refusal came amid expectations that it would not allow Hyun's visit as it has strictly closed its border due to the COVID-19 pandemic and has raised tensions on the Korean Peninsula with weapons tests.
North Korea's refusal by its foreign ministry came as a surprise in South Korea because such a statement has been issued by the North's organizations in charge of inter-Korean affairs.
Koo noted that it was "quite unusual" for North Korea to release a statement on the matter through a foreign ministry official.
Pyongyang has typically responded to issues involving South Korea through its United Front Department, which oversees inter-Korean affairs, leading to the view that North Korea may treat inter-Korean relations as a state-to-state relationship.
Yang Moo-Jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies, told Yonhap News Agency that the latest statement may signal that the North "views inter-Korean relations as a general state-to-state relationship, not as a special relationship."
Source: Yonhap News Agency