-Caveat Lector- (Organized by Sun Myung Moon of the K-CIA?) S.Korea Police Block March to North By KYONG-HWA SEOK .c The Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - Armed with tear gas launchers and water cannons, South Korean riot police blocked thousands of leftist students from marching to the border with North Korea Sunday to promote national unification. After a rally at Seoul National University, several hundred students confronted 8,000 riot police at the school's main gate at nightfall. About 200 students lay on the pavement, shouting: ``Let's accomplish unification!'' Several students were seen hurling fist-sized rocks at police, who did not respond with their tear gas and water cannons. No serious clashes were reported. The students were among about 5,000 leftists who gathered at the university demanding unification of the rival Koreas. The rally was part of activities marking the 54th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japan's colonial rule in 1945. Authorities deployed 13,000 police around the school and along a highway leading to the border, 35 miles away, as the leftists had planned to attend a North Korea-sponsored rally there. The Seoul rally was one of the largest in recent years. Government officials expressed concern that the leftist student movement, which has waned significantly in recent years, may gather momentum. Earlier, the students held a boisterous campus rally, during which they demanded the withdrawal of 37,000 U.S. troops in South Korea, arguing their presence hinders unification. In a separate government-sanctioned pro-unification event, 60,000 South Koreans formed a ``human unification belt,'' a 30-mile chain of people holding hands along a highway from Seoul to the gateway to the border. At the border village of Panmunjom, several hundred North Koreans held a rally calling for unifying the two Koreas under a system that would leave their different systems intact, the North's official Korean Central News Agency said. The border rally, an annual event for the past decade or so, was the highlight of a North Korean celebration of the Aug. 15 Korean Independence Day. South Korea bars its citizens from participating in the rally, which it regards as anti-Seoul propaganda. Past efforts by students to attend it touched off violent clashes with police. The Korean peninsula was partitioned into the communist North and the capitalist South in 1945 with Japan's defeat in World War II. The North and the South are still technically at war, having signed no peace treaty at the end of the 1950-1953 Korean War. People of the two Koreas cannot visit the other side without government approval, which is rarely given. South Korea celebrated the holiday by calling for peace and freeing, among others, 56 political prisoners, including seven North Korean spies. The 56 were among 1,742 convicts set free under a sweeping presidential amnesty. The amnesty also affected 1,115 others who were convicted earlier but have been free on parole. They had their civil rights restored or their criminal records erased. In a nationally televised Independence Day speech, President Kim Dae-jung urged North Korea to accept talks to discuss peace. He denounced North Korea for seeking to deal directly with the United States, while avoiding official dialogue with South Korea. North Korea shuns official dialogue with the Seoul government, which it regards as a U.S. puppet. Despite North Korea's intransigent and hostile stance, the South Korean leader said he will continue to push his policy of engagement with the North's Stalinist regime. Opponents criticize Kim's so-called ``sunshine'' policy as coddling North Korea. DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om