With just days left in his five-year term as South Korean president, North Korea on Saturday unceremoniously bid adieu to Lee Myung Bak, consigning him to the "rubbish of history."
"Traitor Lee is the rubbish of history who cannot be buried in the territory of the nation after his death," the Korean Central News Agency said, while blasting Lee's farewell address last week as a "shameless and arrogant farce and burlesque," full of self-praise about his supposed successes and achievements.
"This is just a last-ditch effort of a politically dead man who is making desperate efforts to avoid a ruin after covering up all the huge crimes he committed against the nation," it said.
In his final address to the nation, Lee said South Korea had come a long way since he took office in February 2008, surmounting the global economic crisis "in the most successful manner in the world" and becoming the seventh-largest trading powerhouse.
To the contrary, KCNA said, "Lee made South Korea be more dependent on the U.S., deteriorated the people's livelihood and plunged the North-South ties to a deadlock."
After a tough five years as president, Lee said, he will be "returning to life as a private citizen" and do whatever he can to "help build a warm-hearted society where each and everyone can harbor a hope to live better."
The KCNA commentary lambasted such remarks.
"He is seriously mistaken if he thinks he can join the South Koreans' community as an 'ordinary citizen,' " KCNA said. "Clear is the fate awaiting Lee: He is bound to have hard time even on his journey to the other world.".