Gaeseong Industrial Complex (GIC) is an industrial complex in Gaeseong, North Korea, which is developed jointly by the two Koreas: South Korea supplies the corporations and capital equipments, and North Korea supplies the workers and the land. Every day, hundreds of South Korean workers--usually middle- and senior-managers--enter and exit North Korea to oversee the operations at the GIC.
As a part of its attempt to raise the tension in the region, North Korea has forbidden South Korean managerial workers from entering North Korea for the last six days. (South Korean workers who were at the GIC, however, were allowed to return home.) Yesterday, North Korea announced that it will shut down the GIC and withdraw all of its workers. Shutting down the GIC is probably the highest level of threat that North Korea may issue, short of actually attacking South Korea. This is because since its founding in 2005, the GIC never closed--not in the face of, for example, the shelling of Yeonpyeong-do in which North Korea actually attacked South Korean territory and killed four people.
Here is a collection of all relevant charts regarding the GIC, created by South Korea's Ministry of Unification. GIC hosts 123 corporations, which manufactured $460 million's worth of products in 2012. It employs over 53,000 North Korean laborers. Last year, nearly 246 vehicles crossed the Armistice Line from South Korea to North Korea every day to deliver supplies to the GIC.
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