Jan. 30 (Bloomberg) -- South Korea told North Korea to stop raising tension on the Korean peninsula after the communist nation said it is scrapping all military and political agreements with the government in Seoul.

“Creating and raising tensions in South-North relations is not beneficial for the Korean peninsula, northeast Asia or for world peace,” Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Ho Nyoun said in Seoul. “We urge North Korea to return to dialogue.”

North Korea accused South Korea of pursuing confrontational policies that are pushing the two nations to “the brink of war,” according to a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency today.

The North Korean announcement comes less than two weeks after it threatened “strong military steps” in response to South Korea’s confrontational policies and about two months after North Korea imposed border restrictions with South Korea.

North Korea also said it is canceling an Agreement on Reconciliation, Non-Aggression, Cooperation and Exchange with South Korea and nullified the military boundary in the West Sea.

“All the agreed points concerning the issue of putting an end to the political and military confrontation between the north and south will be nullified,” the reunification committee in Pyongyang said, according to the official news agency.

Kim Jong Il’s regime has repeatedly called South Korean President Lee Myung Bak a “traitor” and a “sycophant to the U.S.” It has demanded South Korea stop civic groups from launching balloons loaded with so-called propaganda leaflets criticizing Kim.

Seeking Attention

“North Korea seems to be throwing a tantrum to seek attention from an apathetic South Korea,” Ryoo Kihl Jae, a professor at Seoul-based University of North Korean Studies, said by telephone. South Korea should discern North Korea’s “real intentions.”

The government in Pyongyang may be trying to get the attention of President Barack Obama’s new administration in Washington, which hasn’t shown signs of placing North Korea’s nuclear weapons challenge at the top of its must-do list in foreign affairs.

“I think this has a lot to do with Barack Obama and not much to do with South Korea,” Lance Gatling, a Tokyo-based consultant, who is an expert on North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction, said in an e-mailed exchange.

Reconciliation Accords

North Korea and South Korea, divided by one of the world’s most fortified and landmine strewn demilitarized zones, have two major reconciliation agreements, signed by South Korea’s former President Kim Dae Jung in June 2000, and another by former President Roh Moo Hyun in October 2007, after their respective summits with North Korea’s Kim in Pyongyang.

“If North Korea breaches the maritime border we will take decisive action,” South Korea’s Defense Ministry spokesman Won Tae Jae said at a briefing in Seoul today. “As with the military demarcation line on land, we will firmly maintain and defend our northern limit line,” or NLL, as the maritime boundary is called. South Korea will keep a close eye on the movements of North Korea’s military, Won said.

The 1991 agreement on the maritime border aims to avoid naval skirmishes such as the one in June 2002 that resulted in the deaths of six South Korean sailors and an unspecified number on the North Korean side.

“North Korea will raise tensions with South Korea, and try to make nice with the U.S., trying to drive a wedge between the U.S.-South Korea alliance,” Ryoo said. “This would put South Korea in a quandary.”

Nuclear Free

South Korea two days ago welcomed comments from Kim that he is committed to scrapping North Korea’s nuclear program and will continue efforts toward a peaceful resolution.

Kim told a Chinese Communist Party official at a Jan. 23 meeting in Pyongyang that North Korea “is committed to making the Korean peninsula a nuclear-free zone and wishes to live in peace with all the parties concerned,” China’s official Xinhua news agency reported at the time.

North Korea, which tested a nuclear weapon in 2006, has rejected international demands that inspectors be allowed to remove samples from its Yongbyon reactor, the source of the regime’s weapons-grade plutonium. The refusal has stalled six- nation disarmament talks that also involve the U.S., China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.

North Korea and South Korea are still technically at war as their 1950-1953 conflict ended in a truce and not a peace treaty.

South Korean President Lee Myung Bak said inter-Korean relations will improve, insisting the two countries were going through a period of adjustment.

“It’s important to start with a balance, a basis of mutual respect, and I think we will arrive at that point,” Lee said during a discussion today broadcast live on SBS Television in Seoul. “I hope North Korea realizes that South Korea is truly willing to help North Korea. Eventually, our relations will improve.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Heejin Koo in Seoul at hjkoo@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: January 30, 2009 08:28 EST