North Korea Friday again closed its border to South Koreans working at a joint industrial estate, just three days after reopening the frontier, officials said.
The South's unification ministry said the move stranded about 250 people including three foreigners who intended to return Friday from Kaesong, the Seoul-funded estate built just north of the border.
"Our government expresses deep regret over a recurring situation and urges North Korea to immediately normalise (cross-border) passage," ministry spokesman Kim Ho-Nyoun said.
On Monday the communist country switched off military phone and fax lines which are used to approve border crossings. It was protesting at an ongoing US-South Korean military exercise which it sees as a rehearsal for invasion.
The North reopened the frontier without explanation a day later but kept the lines switched off, requiring the exchange of hand-delivered letters to approve crossings.
On Friday the North did not respond to South Korean calls for such approvals, the ministry said.
Some 610 people and 350 vehicles were blocked from travelling northwards Friday morning, the spokesman said.
The North has given no reason for its latest move, Kim said, adding there had been no indications yet whether the frontier would reopen on Saturday.
About 39,000 North Koreans work in 98 South Korean firms at Kaesong, producing items such as watches, clothes, shoes and kitchenware.
The North Monday put its 1.2 million-member army on combat alert in response to the military drill south of the border.
It says the exercise involving tens of thousands of troops is aimed at launching a "second Korean War" while Seoul and its ally Washington insist it is a routine annual defensive drill.
On Friday Rodong Sinmun, newspaper of the North's ruling communist party, said Seoul's conservative government seeks to achieve unification by invading the North in collaboration with foreign forces.
"A village can never be in peace as long as mad dogs run about," it added.
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