North Korea urges South to stick to no-slander deal

North Korea has denounced the South for failing to comply with a deal to stop slandering each other, claiming officials and media here alike are putting the deal's implementation at a "critical crossroads."    After holding two rounds of rare high-level talks last month, the two Koreas agreed to stop making insulting remarks against each other to improve their relations. "However, they have gone the lengths of daring slander ... in gross violation of the agreement," the North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said, citing a statement issued Tuesday by an unidentified spokesman for its delegation for the inter-Korean high-level contact. Pointing to Unification Minister Ryoo Kihl-jae's recent remarks at a lecture that "even soup would not be offered" to the North if it fails to keep a promise, Pyongyang called for stopping "their reckless mudslinging as it is the root cause of all disasters."    The communist country also bashed the South for not taking actions to prevent North Korean defectors here from scattering anti-Pyongyang leaflets, saying Seoul is making "absurd excuses" of freedom of expression, rally and association. The North also warned the South's "conservative media" of "releasing misinformation on the basis of sheer lies," pointing to their suspicions about the results of the North's recent legislative election where leader Kim Jong-un was elected with 100 percent support of voters. "The situation prevailing at present less than a month since the high-level contact is so beyond imagination ... We will closely watch the attitude and moves of the south Korean authorities," the KCNA said. Dismissing the North's demand as "an exhausting dispute," the Seoul government called on Pyongyang to take a "more constructive path" for better inter-Korean relations. "I don't feel any necessity to respond to the North, which has made false claims. As stressed before, we comply with the inter-Korean agreement of not slandering North Korea," Unification Ministry spokeswoman Park Su-jin told reporters. Reiterating that the government should not restrict the basic rights of freedom of expression, assembly and association, she called on the North to stop making such principles an inter-Korean political issue.