S Korea says most workers left Kaesong

South Korea says most remaining workers at the joint industrial zone in North Korea returned home following months of tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The South’s Unification Ministry said on Tuesday that 43 workers left Kaesong industrial complex and crossed back to the South after midnight.

However, seven South Korean supervisors remained in order to negotiate with the North Koreans about some administrative issues, including the unpaid wages of workers, the ministry added.

The complex has been idle since North Korea withdrew its 53,000 employees and blocked access to the site.

The industrial site was launched inside North Korea in 2003 to boost ties between the two neighbors. There are 123 South Korean companies in the complex, employing both South and North Korean workers.

A total of 175 South Korean staff worked at the complex. Some 125 workers left the industrial zone on April 27 after Seoul announced plans to pullout all employees from Kaesong.

The pullout of the workers raises the prospect of the permanent closure of the complex, which is the last point of contact between the two countries.

The Korean Peninsula has been locked in a cycle of escalating military rhetoric following the participation of nuclear-capable US B-52 and B-2 stealth bombers in recent joint military exercises with South Korea.

Pyongyang has warned that if Washington and Seoul launch a preemptive attack, the conflict “will not be limited to a local war, but develop into an all-out war, a nuclear war.”