Seoul (AFP) - North Korea on Saturday blasted South Korean President Park Geun-Hye's proposal on laying the groundwork for reunification through economic exchanges and humanitarian aid as the "daydream of a psychopath".

The blistering attack from the North's powerful National Defence Commission (NDC) was the first official reaction from Pyongyang to a proposal Park made in a speech last month in Dresden in the former East Germany.

She urged the North to expand reunions of families separated by the division of Korea and increase cross-border economic and cultural exchanges, starting with the South bolstering humanitarian aid.

"Germany's unity is for us an example and model for a peaceful reunification," she had said.

An NDC spokesman noted that German reunification came about with the West absorbing the East and accused Park of begging foreign countries to help a reunification in which South Korea absorbed the North.

"This is merely a daydream of psychopath", he said, denouncing Park's proposal, billed as the "Dresden Declaration" by Seoul, as "nonsense" full of "hypocrisy and deception".

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North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un attends a meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee o …

"The fact that in that particular place, Park Geun-Hye lashed her tongue about reunification gave away her sinister mind", he said in a statement carried out by Pyongyang's state media.

Reunification is however enshrined as a national priority in both the South and North Korean constitutions, but pro-merger sentiment in the prosperous South has waned considerably in recent years.

The North Korean spokesman urged Seoul to abide by earlier agreements including a landmark agreement signed in 2000, stressing all these previous accords gave priority to addressing the issue of easing military confrontation.

- Tensions high -

Tensions on the Korean peninsula remain high since the South launched annual military exercises with the United States in February, described by Pyongyang as a rehearsal for an invasion against the North.

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South Korean Kim Se-Rin (R) waves goodbye from a bus to his North Korean sister Kim Young-Sook (C) a …

In a pointed protest at the exercises, Pyongyang carried out a series of rocket and missile launches, capped by its first mid-range missile test since 2009 on March 26.

The two Koreas also traded artillery fire across the tense Yellow Sea border on March 31, after the North dropped around 100 shells across the maritime boundary during a live-fire drill.

The exchange followed a North Korean warning that it might carry out a "new" form of nuclear test -- a possible reference to a uranium-based device or a miniaturised warhead small enough to fit on a ballistic missile.

Park also said in the Dresden speech that the South would help funnel international funding to the North's economic development should Pyongyang give up its nuclear weapons programmes.

But the NDC spokesman said: "They should bear in mind that the tongue-lashing of Park Geun-Hye is the first root cause of deteriorating the North-South relations and beclouding the prospect of the nation."

"It is the unanimous view of the public that the North-South relations will be smoother than now only if Park keeps her disgusting mouth closed", he said.

Despite its verbal attacks, professor Yang Moo-Jin of the University of North Korean Studies said Pyongyang was likely to ease up and return to dialogue late this month as the South and the United States were winding up their military exercises.

Diplomatic efforts to resuscitate long-stalled six-party talks on disarming North Korea also appear to have been rekindled.

The US State Department said Friday that special envoy Glyn Davies would meet with his Chinese counterpart Wu Dawei in New York and Washington next week for discussions on the denuclearisation of North Korea.

Wu on Friday held talks with South Korean counterpart Hwang Joon-Kuk in Beijing on ways to "resume meaningful dialogue" aimed at bringing about "substantial progress" in the North's denuclearisation, Hwang told journalists.

N. Korea blasts S. Korea’s reunification offer

Pyongyang calls President Park Geun-Hye’s proposal of peaceful reunions of families the "daydream of a psychopath."
Tensions high

SLOVYANSK, Ukraine (AP) — Several dozen armed men seized a police station in a city in eastern Ukraine and hoisted the Russian flag above the building Saturday as tensions in the country's Russian-speaking regions intensify.

The city of Slovyansk is about 90 kilometers (55 miles) north of the regional center, Donetsk, where pro-Russian protesters have occupied a government building for nearly a week.

About 20 men in balaclavas armed with automatic rifles and pistols were guarding the entrance to the police station in the city of about 120,000 people, and another 20 were believed to be inside. They wore St. George's ribbons, which have become a symbol of pro-Russian protesters in eastern Ukraine. The ribbons were originally associated with the Soviet Union's victory in World War II.

Eastern Ukraine, which has a large Russian-speaking population, has seen waves of protests since Kremlin-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted in late February. The protesters allege that the authorities who took over are nationalists and "fascists" who aim to suppress the ethnic Russians in Ukraine.

The predominantly ethnic Russian region of Crimea voted in a referendum last month to split off from Ukraine and was subsequently annexed by Russia in moves that West has denounced as illegitimate.

A masked guard in Slovyansk, who gave his name only as Sergei, told The Associated Press they have "only one demand: a referendum and joining Russia."

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Armed pro-Russian activists occupy the police station carrying riot shields in the eastern Ukraine t …

The man said they seized the building because they wanted to protect it from radical nationalists from western Ukraine and "the junta who seized power in Kiev."

"We don't want to be slaves of America and the West," he said. "We want to live with Russia."

The Interior Ministry said in a statement that the attackers' goal was to seize arms from the police station. They said there were about 40 automatic rifles and 400 pistols as well as ammunition inside.

A video from the scene saw one man carrying a sniper rifle. An AP reporter saw another man loading the magazine of a pistol at the police station.

Interior Minister Arsen Avakov pledged a "very tough response" to the seizure while local media reported special forces dispatched to the area.

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Armed pro-Russian activists occupy the police station in the eastern Ukraine town of Slovyansk on Sa …

Local sympathizers brought tires to the police station to start building barricades.

Gunshots rang out in the background in a video from the scene after an armed man shouted to a cameraman to stop recording. No casualties were immediately reported.

An Associated Press crew saw about 10 men wearing camouflage and carrying automatic rifles at the entrance to the town late Saturday afternoon. The men were building a barricade with tires.

The Kiev authorities and the United States have accused Russia of fomenting the unrest in the east and seeking to use it as a pretext for sending in troops. Russia has massed forces in areas near the Ukrainian border.

But Mayor Nelya Shtepa told the AP that she held talks with the protesters and said they were local residents, not Russians.

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Armed pro-Russian activists occupy the police station in the eastern Ukrainian town of Slovyansk car …

"They told me: 'We don't have anything against you,' " she said, adding that the men said they "want to be heard, want a dialogue with authorities in Kiev."

Protesters, who have held the administration building in Donetsk since Sunday, initially called for a referendum on secession but later reduced the demand to a vote on autonomy within Ukraine with the possibility of holding another later on whether to join Russia.

Russia's Foreign Ministry on Friday warned the Ukrainian government against using force against protesters, saying that such action would derail the talks on settling the crisis between the United States, the European Union, Russia and Ukraine set for next week, as well as any other diplomatic efforts. It lashed out at the U.S. warning to slap more sanctions on Russia in case of an escalation of the conflict, saying that "an escalation is only and exclusively possible if Kiev dares to do so, relying on massive support of the U.S. and the EU."

___

Nataliya Vasilyeva contributed to this report from Kiev.

Protesters seize police station in eastern Ukraine

Pro-Russia activists in the town of Slovyansk say they want a dialogue with authorities in Kiev.
'Tough response' pledged

BERLIN (AP) — After racing against the clock in an all-night session, the U.N.'s expert panel on climate change was putting the final touches Saturday on a scientific guide to help governments, industries and regular people take action to stop global warming from reaching dangerous levels.

As always when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change adopts one of its high-profile reports, the weeklong talks in Berlin were slowed by wrangling between scientists and governments over which words, charts and tables to use in the roughly 30-page summary of a much bigger scientific report.

The painstaking process is meant to clarify the complex world of climate science to non-scientists but it also reflects the brinksmanship that characterizes international talks on climate action — so far unsuccessful in their goal to stop the rise of man-made carbon emissions blamed for global warming.

"Sometimes it's framed as if what the IPCC does is 'just the facts, ma'am,' and that of course is not accurate," said Steve Rayner, an Oxford scientist who has taken part in three of the IPCC's previous assessments, but not this one.

"It's not pure science and it's not just politics," but a blend of both, Rayner said.

In Berlin, the politics showed through in a dispute over how to categorize countries in graphs showing the world's carbon emissions, which are currently growing the fastest in China and other developing countries. Like many scientific studies, the IPCC draft used a breakdown of emissions from low, lower-middle, upper-middle and high income countries.

Some developing countries objected and wanted the graphs to follow the example of U.N. climate talks and use just two categories — developed and developing — according to three participants who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the IPCC session was closed to the public.

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FILE - In this April 3, 2014 file photo giant machines dig for brown coal at the open-cast mining Ga …

In earlier submitted comments obtained by AP, the U.S. suggested footnotes indicating where readers could "view specific countries listed in each category in addition to the income brackets."

That reflects a nagging dispute in the U.N. talks, which are supposed to produce a global climate agreement next year. The U.S. and other industrialized nations want to scrap the binary rich-poor division, saying large emerging economies such as China, Brazil and India must adopt more stringent emissions cuts than poorer countries. The developing countries are worried it's a way for rich countries to shirk their own responsibilities to cut emissions.

The deadlock over the graphs appeared to have ended early Saturday after 20 hours of backroom negotiations led by IPCC vice chairman Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a Belgian.

"I offered some Belgian Easter chocolate eggs to the participants of the Contact group at midnight: they helped!" van Ypersele wrote on Twitter early Saturday.

Another snag: oil-rich Saudi Arabia objected to text saying emissions need to go down by 40 percent to 70 percent by 2050 for the world to stay below 2 degrees C (3.6 F) of warming, participants told AP. One participant said the Saudis were concerned that putting down such a range was "policy-prescriptive," even though it reflects what the science says.

The final document, to be released Sunday, is expected to say that a global shift to renewable energy from fossil fuels like oil and coal are required to avoid potentially devastating sea level rise, flooding, droughts and other impacts of warming.

The report on mitigating climate change was the third of the IPCC's four-part assessment on climate change, its first since 2007.

Swedish environmental economist Thomas Sterner, a lead author of one of the chapters in the report, said the IPCC process can be frustrating to scientists.

"There's a fight over every comma sign," he told AP.

In a blog post from Berlin he said scientists addressing the meeting were told to "Keep our statements short and concise, avoid jargon, do not lecture the delegates, do not become emotional."

Chris Field, who co-chaired another IPCC session in Japan last month and sits on the panel's executive committee but did not have a direct role in the Berlin session, said one way to think about the process is that scientists have control of a two-way valve and can move findings into or out of the summary for policy-makers. The governments have a one-way valve and can only move things out of the document.

"The role of this one-way valve is important in thinking about why the findings of the IPCC always feel so measured and carefully couched," he said.

Many of the government interventions are "incredibly helpful" in making the text clearer, he added. "It is a pretty amazing process. But some of the interventions are not quite as time efficient."

New UN climate report balances science, politics

The panel puts final touches on a scientific guide for governments, industries, and regular people.
'A fight over every comma'

By Pavel Polityuk and Thomas Grove

KIEV/MOSCOW (Reuters) - Armed separatists took virtual control of a city in eastern Ukraine on Saturday and Kiev prepared troops to deal with what it called an "act of aggression by Russia".

Pro-Russian activists carrying automatic weapons seized government buildings in Slaviansk and set up barricades on the outskirts of the city. Official buildings in several neighboring towns were also attacked.

The developments have increased concerns of a possible "gas war" that could disrupt energy supplies across the continent.

"The Ukrainian authorities consider the events of the day as a display of external aggression from Russia," Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said in a statement.

"Units of the interior and defense ministries are implementing an operational response plan," he added.

Russia and Ukraine have been in confrontation since protests in Kiev forced the Moscow-backed president from office, and the Kremlin sent troops to annex Crimea, the home of its Black Sea Fleet and a part of Russia until 1954.

Moscow denies any plan to send in forces or split Ukraine, but the Western-leaning authorities in Kiev believe Russia is trying to create a pretext to interfere again. NATO says Russian armed forces are massing on Ukraine's eastern border, while Moscow says they are on normal manoeuvres.

At least 20 men armed with pistols and rifles took over the police station and a security services headquarters in Slaviansk, a city of over 100,000 people about 150 km (90 miles) from the border with Russia.

Officials said the men had seized hundreds of pistols from arsenals in the buildings. The militants replaced the Ukrainian flag on one of the buildings with the red, white and blue Russian flag.

Washington backed Kiev's assessment that Moscow was responsible. "Worrisome violence in ... Ukraine today. Russia again seems to be behind it," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Twitter.

ROADBLOCKS AROUND CITY

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An armed man speaks on his mobile phone at an improvised checkpoint in Slaviansk, April 12, 2014. Pr …

On a road leading into Slaviansk, other members of the group, armed with automatic rifles, set up a roadblock and checked vehicles entering the city, a Reuters reporter said.

There was no sign of any Ukrainian law enforcement officials in the city.

Ukraine's Western-backed government warned of tough action if the militants did not lay down their weapons, but it was unclear if the local law enforcement agencies were taking orders from Kiev any more after the local police chief quit.

Kostyantyn Pozhydayev came out to speak to pro-Russian protesters at his offices in the regional capital, Donetsk, and told them he was stepping down "in accordance with your demands". Some of his officers left the building.

The protesters occupied the ground floor of the Donetsk police headquarters and a black and orange flag adopted by pro-Russian separatists flew over the building in place of the Ukrainian flag.

The occupations are a potential flashpoint because if protesters are killed or hurt by Ukrainian forces, that could prompt the Kremlin to intervene to protect the local Russian-speaking population, a repeat of the scenario in Crimea.

Oleksandr Turchynov, the acting Ukrainian president, called an emergency meeting of the national security council for Saturday evening to discuss the unrest in the east.

Ukraine's acting foreign minister, Andriy Deshchytsia, said he had spoken by telephone with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and demanded Moscow stop what he called "provocative actions" by its agents in eastern Ukraine.

Lavrov, in a statement issued by his ministry, said there were no Russian agents in the region and that it would be "unacceptable" if Ukrainian authorities were to order the storming of the buildings.

Ukrainian commentator Sergei Leshchenko said the burst of activity by pro-Russian groups was an attempt by the Kremlin to give it a strong negotiating position before international talks about Ukraine in Geneva next Thursday.

Russia is expected to argue at the talks for a revamp of Ukraine's constitution to give a large degree of autonomy to eastern Ukraine, something Kiev and its Western backers reject.

"Russia will come to the talks with the position that 'Donetsk and several neighboring regions are already ours - now let's talk about federalization'," said Leshchenko, a commentator with the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper.

'GAS WAR'

With the crisis in Ukraine still unresolved, the gas dispute threatens to affect millions of people across Europe.

A large proportion of the natural gas that EU states buy from Russia is pumped via Ukrainian territory, so if Russia makes good on a threat to cut off Ukraine for non-payment of its bills, customers further west will have supplies disrupted.

Russia is demanding Kiev pay a much higher price for its gas, and settle unpaid bills. Russian state-owned gas giant Gazprom and its Ukrainian counterpart, Naftogaz, are in talks, but the chances of an agreement are slim.

"I would say we are coming nearer to a solution of the situation, but one in the direction that is bad for Ukraine," Ukrainian Energy Minister Yuri Prodan said in an interview with the German newspaper Boersenzeitung

"We are probably steering towards Russia turning off its gas provision," he was quoted as saying.

That raised the specter of a repeat of past "gas wars", when Ukraine's gas was cut off with a knock-on effect on supplies to EU states.

The scope for compromise narrowed after the Naftogaz chief executive told a Ukrainian newspaper that Kiev was suspending payments to Gazprom pending a conclusion of talks on a new deal.

Ukraine has de facto stopped payments already because it failed to make an installment of over $500 million due this month to Russian state gas giant Gazprom.

Moscow says it does not want to turn off Ukraine's gas if it can be avoided, and that it will honor all commitments to supply its EU customers.

(Additional reporting by Conor Humphries in Kiev, Alexei Anishchuk, Alessandra Prentice and Vladimir Soldatkin in Moscow, William Schomberg in London, Annika Breidthardt in Berlin, Lina Kushch in Donetsk, Ukraine and Gleb Garanich in Slaviansk, Ukraine; Writing by Christian Lowe and Conor Humphries; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Kiev says Moscow is behind coordinated attacks and gunfights carried out by pro-Russia militants.
Emergency meeting called