Minju Joson Friday in a bylined commentary terms this a base artifice to ensure the conservative regime's stay in power at any cost through the forthcoming "presidential election".

It is long since the ministry was reduced to the one for confrontation with compatriots and anti-reunification operations quite contrary to its signboard, the commentary notes, and goes on:

It is preposterous for the ministry to talk about "the possibility of political activities" of those organizations in the run-up to the "presidential election" and call for "self-restraint". By origin, administrative organizations in south Korea are barred from participating in the election campaign. The "Ministry of Unification" can never be an exception in keeping itself neutral in the election. Nevertheless, it is openly engaged in political activities to ensure the conservative regime's stay in power. It is none other than the agents of the ministry that labeled the pro-reunification patriotic organizations and personages working for the implementation of the June 15 joint declaration and the October 4 declaration "forces following the north" and prodded human scum into operations to scatter anti-DPRK leaflets behind the scene. The recent action taken by the ministry to send the above-said paper to the NGOs is part of its political activities which reflected the interest

s of the conservative regime keen to stay in power.

It reveals its attempt to provide the conservative regime with a pretext for cracking down upon those organizations. The ministry's ulterior purpose is to turn the situation before the "presidential election" favorable for the conservative forces by inventing that pretext.