Pyongyang, November 7 (KCNA) -- Civic and public organizations of people of various social standings of south Korea held a press conference in Seoul on November 3 demanding a halt to the dangerous exercises for a war of aggression against the north.

Speeches were made at the press conference to be followed by the reading out of a press release.

The press release termed the Hoguk joint military exercises being staged in south Korea dangerous saber-rattling aimed at provoking the north and escalating the confrontation and tension on the Korean Peninsula and in the rest of Northeast Asia.

Through the exercises the U.S. and the south Korean authorities seek to upgrade the "CONPLAN 5029" aimed at a preemptive attack on the DPRK into "OPLAN" in a bid to put their scenario for a war against the north into practice, the press release noted, and continued:

This time Lee Myung Bak asked the U.S. to hurl even U.S. marines stationed in Japan into the madcap war exercises targeted against compatriots. This is desperate efforts to strain the situation on the Korean Peninsula and bring back the south-north relations into those in the era of the Cold War.

Demanding the U.S. and the south Korean authorities immediately halt the aggressive war exercises against the north, the press release declared that the civic and public organizations would wage a positive struggle to achieve peace, stability and reunification on the Korean Peninsula.