2010-11-02 22:12

PYONGYANG - The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Tuesday issued a statement once again denying any connection to the sinking of the "Cheonan" ship of the Republic of Korea (ROK), the official news agency KCNA reported.

The incident, which is "a sheer fabrication and a conspiratorial farce," had nothing to do with the DPRK, the DPRK's National Defense Commission (NDC) said in the first part of a statement.

As the US and the ROK not only objected to the field survey but also rejected even the DPRK's proposal to jointly survey and estimate all material evidence that they claimed was lifted from the waters where the ship sank after bringing them to Panmunjom, the NDC decided to disclose the truth of the case to the world on the basis of information gathered so far.

The statement cited analysis by foreign experts and media that challenged the investigation results that the warship was sunken by the torpedo of a DPRK submarine, from 12 aspects including aluminum alloy fragments, the propelling body, torpedo design, the writing style of "No 1," and the course of channel style infiltration.

The event is a conspiratorial case fabricated by the ROK and the US in order to escalate the confrontation and meet its strategic interests in the Far Eastern region and the Northeast Asian region, the statement stressed.

There is a lot of information proving the falsity of the investigation results announced by the US and the ROK. If the US and the ROK continued "making a fuss" about the "Cheonan" case, the DPRK will issue the second and third installments of the statement to disclose the truth, the statement warned.

The 1,200-ton "Cheonan" with 104 crew members on board sank on March 26 near the maritime border with the DPRK after an unexplained explosion. Only 58 sailors were rescued alive shortly after the sinking.

The ROK investigators released the results of the investigation on May 20 that the "Cheonan" was sunken by a torpedo of the DPRK.

In response, a spokesman for the DPRK's National Defense Commission issued a statement on May 20 rejecting the ROK's allegations and asked to send an inspection group to the ROK to verify material evidence. However, the ROK rejected that request.