Labour Minister Padermchai Sasomsap said Monday the Thai embassy in South Korea has prepared a plan for "speedy evacuation"of Thais from the country in case of hostilities.

South Korean President Park Geun-hye on Monday vowed "strong retaliation" to any provocation by North Korea after Pyongyang declared it was formally at war with Seoul.

In a meeting with senior military officials and Defence Minister Kim Kwan-jin, Ms Park said she took the near-daily stream of bellicose threats emanating from the North "very seriously".

"I believe that we should make a strong and immediate retaliation without any other political considerations if (the North) stages any provocation against our people," she said.

About 44,000 Thais are in South Korea, most of them labourers. Ten Thai employers are in North Korea, according to foreign ministry records.

The emergency evacuation plan would see the embassy set up temporary shelters in "safe" places like Busan, and then arranging flights and ships as available, to take the Thais to Japan.

Mr Padermchai said the order to prepare contingency plays came from Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. She directed the foreign ministry to closely monitor the conflict between the two Koreas, and to take care of Thais in South Korea.

Ms Yingluck and the foreign ministry have called for talks in Korea, and called on both Koreas to avoid any type of violence or force.

President Park's strong words were a departure from the country's previous stance on threats from the North, when officials have played down the prospect of any attack.

A conservative who had advocated cautious engagement with the North during her election campaign, the new president has taken a more hard-line position since assuming office in February, shortly after the North conducted its third nuclear test.

Tensions have been high since the North's young new leader, Kim Jong-un, ordered a nuclear weapons test in February, breaching UN sanctions and ignoring warnings from North Korea's closest ally, China, not to do so.

In protest at joint South Korean-US military drills, North Korea last month declared it was ripping up the armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean war void and threatened a "pre-emptive nuclear strike" on South Korean and US targets.

On Saturday, it announced that it had formally entered into a "state of war" with South Korea.

Seoul and Washington have warned of severe repercussions in the event of any aggression, with the US deploying nuclear capable B-52 and B-2 stealth bombers, as well as F-22 stealth fighters over South Korea as a "deterrence".

The advanced, radar-evading F-22 Raptors were deployed to Osan Air Base, the main US Air Force base in South Korea, from Japan to support ongoing bilateral exercises, the US military command in South Korea said in a statement that urged North Korea to restrain itself.

"[North Korea) will achieve nothing by threats or provocations, which will only further isolate North Korea and undermine international efforts to ensure peace and stability in Northeast Asia," the statement said.

Sabre-rattling on the Korean peninsula drew a plea for peace from Pope Francis, who in his first Easter Sunday address called for a diplomatic solution to the crisis on the Korean peninsula.

"Peace in Asia, above all on the Korean peninsula: may disagreements be overcome and a renewed spirit of reconciliation grow," he said, speaking in Italian.
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MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine government expressed readiness on today to evacuate the 40,000 Filipinos in South Korea to the extent of tapping commercial vesselsin the event that the recurring tensions on the Korean Peninsula escalate further.

Deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said that the government has just reactivated the contingency plan that it had when the tensions increased in the area sometime in early 2011.

"We consider all options. One of the options will be to employ commercial vessels. You've seen that in the case of our evacuations in Libya, also in Syria, and also earlier in Lebanon," she said in a press briefing.

But Valte said that the government was hoping that the tensions in the Korean Peninsula would not escalate so that evacuation of Filipinos would not be necessary.

"We are one with everybody in hoping that the tensions decrease in that particular area," she said.

Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) recently declared that it is in a "state of war" with South Korea
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