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Yesterday's "top story" in S. Korea:

 "The 12.2 Imjingak Riot"
 

Today's Hankyoreh reported following about the "event":

Leaflet release ends with violence

 
Progressive and conservative groups clash over release of leaflets to N. Korea

One person has been injured and one person has been arrested by police after progressive and conservative groups clashed over the launching of anti-North Korea leaflet balloons.

According to statements by members of both sides, six members from the conservative Fighters for Free North Korea and Abductees’ Family Union had planned to go to “Freedom Bridge” on the outskirts of Paju City on Tuesday to airlift 100,000 leaflets using 10 hot air balloons.

Approximately 40 members of the progressive group Jinbo Corea (Progressive Korea) had already arrived at the site, however, and were holding a press conference denouncing the leaflet offensive. The group members said the “sending of leaflets slandering the North” by “anti-North groups” is “a violation of the agreement to stop mutual slander along the Military Demarcation Line, agreed to after the June 15 Joint Statement” that “is making inter-Korean relations, already poor, even more difficult.”

The conservatives arrived in a truck about ten minutes later and a clash ensued. Park Sang-hak, 40, head of the Fighters for Free North Korea, fired a tear-gas pistol into the air.

Another man from the same organization in charge of the balloon detail swung a wrench at people. Some 50 police officers positioned themselves between the two groups, but one of the progressive activists had already been injured, later receiving six stitches in hospital. The conservative activist who had been swinging the wrench was placed under arrest.

Despite obstruction from the progressives, the conservative groups managed to launch one balloon carrying ten thousand leaflets. Members of the progressive organization made off with some of the leaflets that had remained in the conservatives’ truck.

“The other side incited us first by demanding to know who was kidnapped by North Korea,” said Choi Sung-yong, the head of the Abductees’ Family Union. “We are going to launch leaflets as often as we can until the issue of the abducted is resolved.”

Jeong Yong-jun of Jinbo Corea told a different story.

“We didn’t go there for a clash, but the conservative groups came at us with violence,” he said. “The government needs to stop just saying that it is going to restrain the launching of leaflet balloons and take actual action.”

Jinbo Corea says it is going to file a legal complaint with the police against Park for firing a tear-gas pistol and the member of his organization for swinging the wrench.

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_northkorea/325413.html

And from today's (bourgeois) Korea Herald:

N. Korea leaflets foment ideological clash

An ideological conflict has formed over the sending of anti-North Korea leaflets by South Korean activists into the North's territory.

Dozens of South Korean conservative and liberal activists scuffled yesterday at Imjingak near the western inter-Korean border, as the latter group tried to derail the former's attempt to send the propaganda pamphlets into the North.

A group of North Korean defectors here and family members of South Koreans kidnapped by the North gathered at the venue again earlier in the day to fly balloons that carry 100,000 anti-North leaflets and a thousand one-dollar bills into the communist soil.

However, their plan was blocked by another group of 40 liberal activists who also showed up on the scene to thwart the leaflet flying.

The liberals charged that the spreading of the leaflets would further aggravate inter-Korean ties, which have already deteriorated under the conservative Lee Myung-bak government. Their argument was in line with the liberal Democratic Party's criticism on the leaflet dissemination on Monday. The DP labeled the conservative activists as traitors to South Korea, accusing them of heightening tensions between the South and the North.

Members from both sides were engaged in a fierce physical collision after the liberal members forcefully seized balloons and leaflets belonging to the conservative group from a truck. Conservative members shot blanks from a gas pistol.

Police deployed on scene tried to calm the situation, and the flyer sending was delayed for hours.

"The leaflets would put pressure on the North to return to dialogue with South Korea," said Choi Sung-yong, leader of the union representing family members of kidnapped South Koreans.

Choi said their actions are also taken in retaliation to the communist North's recent measures to tighten up border control against South Korea..

More reports about the "event" you can read/see here:
☞ Groups scuffle with protesters as they send leaflets into N. Korea (Yonhap)

☞ Brawl Near Koreas' Border (WaPo's article)

☞ S. Korean Activists Clash Near DMZ (WaPo, video)  

☞ "다 죽여버리겠어"..가스총 쏘고 스패너로 내리치고 (민중의소리)  

☞ 삐라살포단체, 진보단체 회원들 폭행 (VoP, video)