N.Korea Attacks Park Geun-hye

North Korea's state press took aim on Tuesday at Park Geun-hye, widely tipped as the conservative presidential hopeful in next year's election. The Rodong Sinmun daily said Park possessed the "mindset of a dictator" and that, far from being ashamed of her past as the daughter of a military strongman, she seems proud of it.

Park is the daughter of former president Park Chung-hee and now heads a committee aiming to reform the recently renamed ruling Saenuri Party.

The paper said no matter how much Park claims to support change and reform, she cannot hide her "true colors" as "coming from a bloodline of the fascist and anti-unification Yushin Constitution."

The authoritarian Yushin (revitalizing reform) Constitution of 1972 permitted Park senior to be re-elected for an unlimited number of six-year terms.

"The Saenuri Party has fallen completely under Park Geun-hye's control ahead of the general elections" in April, the paper said.

It was a rare criticism of a senior South Korean figure sanctified in the eyes of the North Korean regime by having met former leader Kim Jong-il. Park and Kim met in May 2002 in Pyongyang.

A government official said, "North Korea is obviously trying to meddle in the elections because it worries that inter-Korean relations will go from bad to worse if the Saenuri Party retains a majority of seats in the National Assembly."