SEOUL: South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak Wednesday urged North Korea to learn from recent political reforms in Myanmar and end decades of isolation.
In a speech marking the South's Memorial Day, Lee reiterated his commitment to expanding ties with the southeast Asian nation, describing its recent sweeping democratic reforms as an "irresistible trend".
He visited Myanmar last month in the first state visit since 1983 when then-South Korean President Chun Doo-Hwan narrowly escaped a bomb attack by Pyongyang agents that left 17 South Koreans dead.
"Myanmar, despite ample natural resources and a large territory, has a per-capita income of only $700, similar to North Korea's due to...a closed socialist economy and international isolation in the past," Lee said.
But the longtime global outcast has been gradually accepted into the international fold, he said, as reforms saw the election of a quasi-civilian government and democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi elected to parliament.
"The global wind of freedom and reform...blowing through North Africa and now in Asia is a irresistible historic trend no one can stand against," Lee said.
"I asked President Thein Sein to relay Myanmar's message of opening a new era to North Korea, which is close to the country," he said.
Myanmar -- formerly known as Burma -- has maintained close ties with the communist North for decades. But Yangon promised during Lee's visit last month to refrain from military cooperation with the nuclear-armed North.
Ties between the two Koreas have been icy since Seoul accused Pyongyang of torpedoing its warship in March 2010, in an attack which left 46 dead.
The North angrily denied involvement, but went on to shell a border island in November in the same year killing a further four South Koreans.
The impoverished and isolated state has recently increased hostile rhetoric towards its neighbour as the communist regime tries to firm up the nascent leadership of its new young ruler, Kim Jong-Un.
Jong-Un, believed to be in his late twenties, took over from his deceased father and longtime leader, Kim Jong-Il, after his death last December.
The North's military Monday threatened rocket attacks on the offices of South Korean media outlets for their critical coverage of a mass children's event in Pyongyang.
It accused conservative South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak of inciting negative media coverage and called on him to apologise to avert an attack.
Lee said in the speech Wednesday Seoul would "respond with stern retaliation" to any provocation and vowed to maintain peace in the Korean peninsula with a "water-tight defence posture".
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