S.Korea drops plan to send aid to flood victims in N.Korea

South Korea has dropped a plan to provide emergency relief aid to North Korean flood victims, citing the absence of a response from the North, an official said Tuesday. The move illustrates lingering tensions on the Korean Peninsula over two deadly attacks by the North on the South last year, according to South Korean (Yonhap) News Agency. North Korea asked the South to provide food, cement and heavy construction equipment after Seoul offered to send 5 billion won about ($4.1 million) of relief aid to the North in August. South Korea rejected the request and said it would deliver baby food, biscuits and instant noodles to the North. The North did not respond to the humanitarian aid offer, forcing South Korea to end its process for the assistance, the Unification Ministry official said. He added that it is regrettable that South Korea''s aid won''t reach its intended beneficiaries in the North. Seoul''s decision comes days after the United Nations food agency said a third of North Korean children under the age of five are chronically malnourished. The World Food Program warned on its Web site that many more children are at risk of slipping into acute stages of malnutrition unless targeted assistance is sustained. Experts have said the North''s food shortages may get worse after devastating floods washed away tens of thousands of hectares of farmland in the North in recent months. The North has relied on international handouts since the late 1990s when it suffered a massive famine that was estimated to have killed 2 million people.