Koreans Blasted

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Koreans Blasted

Source: Reuters, 2004-04-23

Candidate: Big Government

DANDONG, China - China on Friday confirmed the first fatalities from a massive explosion of fuel-laden trains in North Korea (news - web sites), while South Korea (news - web sites) offered emergency help and Chinese hospitals along the border with the North prepared for a possible influx of wounded.

AP Photo

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Secretive communist North Korea remained silent on Thursday's train collision in the bustling industrial town of Ryongcho, leaving the death toll unclear.

South Korean media reports said as many as 3,000 people may have been killed or injured and a South Korean official warned of "large number" of casualties. But the only confirmed casualties were two Chinese killed and 12 injured, which China's official news agency Xinhua reported, citing Beijing's embassy in North Korea. The report did not say how many North Koreans were killed.

South Korea's Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun said Friday the explosion was triggered by a collision of fuel-laden trains and said South Korea believes there to be "a large number of people killed or injured."

In a dispatch from Pyongyang, China's official Xinhua news agency, without citing sources, said the explosion was caused by the leaking of ammonium nitrate in one of the trains. Ammonium nitrate is used in some explosives, as a fertilizer, and in rocket fuel.

There was no sign in Dandong, the Chinese border city nearest to the crash site, of injured people being brought out of North Korea. But the city's three biggest hospitals were preparing for a possible surge of patients.

"We're ready to offer our close neighbor our best medical help anytime," an official at Dandong Chinese Hospital said.

The North Korean blast also knocked down more than 20 houses, China's Foreign Ministry and Xinhua said. Among the 12 injured Chinese, two sustained serious injuries and the remaining 10 were lightly wounded, Xinhua said.

North Korea declared an emergency in the area while cutting off international telephone lines to prevent crash details from leaking out, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported. The North's official KCNA news agency still had not mentioned the disaster by Friday, a full day later.

In Seoul, Unification Minister Jeong said China was urging North Korea to send the injured across the border to hospitals in China, but that Pyongyang was instead asking China to dispatch relief workers to the scene.

Officials in Dandong, about 12 miles away from Ryongchon, said they were prepared to provide medical and rescue assistance

"There was an explosion and we believe there was a large number of people killed or injured," Jeong said. "For the moment, there is no official confirmation from North Korea, and we have difficulties confirming details."

The chief of the South Korean Red Cross is currently in North Korea on an unrelated business trip and is to assess the accident and evaluate what kind of relief North Korea might need, Jeong said.

The blast reportedly occurred nine hours after North Korean leader Kim Jong Il passed through the station on his way home from a three-day visit to China. But given the circumstances and the timing of the blast, Jeong said: "I don't think sabotage was involved."

Jeong said the blast was caused by trains loaded with fuel colliding at the station, but did not specify how many trains were involved. At the time, an international passenger train carrying many ethnic Chinese was parked in the station, South Korea's mass circulation JoongAng Ilbo newspaper reported, without citing sources.

The British Broadcasting Corporation showed on its Web site what it claimed to be a black-and-white satellite photo taken 18 hours after the reported explosion.

The photo showed huge clouds of black smoke billowing from the alleged blast site.

�

South Korea's acting President Goh Kun ordered his government to prepare assistance if necessary. The country's Red Cross also said they were prepared to offer food and clothes if requested. The explosion devastated a densely populated neighborhood around the station and spurred North Korean authorities to declare a "state of emergency" in the area, South Korean media reported.

"If the report is true, this is a very tragic accident and we relay deep condolences," South Korea's acting President Goh Kun said at a meeting with his senior staffs.

North Korean authorities "asked the North Korean Red Cross to go up to the accident site and make an assessment. On the basis of that assessment, which will be done very quickly, we will respond," said John Sparrow, a Red Cross spokesman in Beijing.

Ryongchon has a reported population of 130,000 and is known for its chemical and metalwork plants.
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