Beijing: North Korea claims to have
suffered USD64.96 trillion in human and material damage from
the United States over the 60-year period from September 1945,
the Pyongyang's official news agency said.
Of the total, USD26.17 trillion relates to at least
5,060,770 civilians North Korea says were killed, wounded, or
abducted by United States, and USD13.73 trillion stemmed from
economic sanctions, Korean Central News Agency said in a
report.
Another USD1.17 trillion in damage was incurred by the
stoppage in construction of light water reactors and
suspension of the provision of heavy oil to North Korea as
agreed in the US-North Korea Agreed Framework in 1994, the
report said.
The deal required Pyongyang to freeze and eventually
dismantle its weapons-grade nuclear facilities in exchange for
being provided with two light-water reactors for power
generation.
The calculation was made by the Committee for
Investigation into Damage Done by the US to the Northern Half
of Korea, taking into account damage North Korea suffered from
the 1950-1953 Korean War, economic sanctions and other
"crimes" it alleges to have committed by the United States.
"The total amount will be incalculable" if political and
moral damages caused by slandering the sovereignty and dignity
of North Korea and infliction of moral pressure on the Koreans
by the US moves for a new war and threats of pre-emptive
nuclear attack are included, according to the report.
KCNA released the report a day before the 60th
anniversary of the start of the Korean War, which ended in an
armistice, not with a peace treaty.
"The US imperialists, chieftain of evils, committed the
most barbarous and hideous crimes against the Korean people
ever in the world history of wars during the last Korean War,"
the report said.
Successive US administrations have applied "systematic
and overall economic sanctions and blockade against all
sectors including trade, finance, investment, real estate,
insurance, transport, post and telecommunications and visits
of people for more than a half century to isolate and
suffocate the Democratic People's Republic of Korea," it said.
PTI
First Published: Saturday, June 26, 2010, 13:00