SEOUL, ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea (AP) β ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea says it will restart anti-North Korean propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts in border areas in response to continuing North Korean campaigns to drop trash on the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ with balloons.
Following an emergency security meeting led by ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean national security director Chang Ho-jin, the officials decided to install and begin the loudspeaker broadcasts in border areas on Sunday, Seoulβs presidential office said in a statement. The move is certain to anger North Korea and potentially prompt it to take its own retaliatory military steps.
Chang and other ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean security officials berated Pyongyang for attempting to cause βanxiety and disruptionβ in ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea and stressed that North Korea will be βsolely responsibleβ for any future escalation of tensions between the Koreas.
North Korea over the weekend flew hundreds to ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea in its third such campaign since late May, the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅βs military said, just days after ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean activists floated their own balloons to scatter propaganda leaflets in the North.
North Korea has so far sent more than 1,000 balloons to drop tons of trash and manure in the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ in retaliation against ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean civilian leafletting campaigns, adding to tensions between the war-divided rivals amid a diplomatic stalemate over the Northβs nuclear ambitions.
The resumption of ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Koreaβs loudspeaker broadcasts has been widely anticipated since last week, when ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea a 2018 tension-easing agreement with North Korea. The move allowed for the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ to resume propaganda campaigns and possibly restart live-fire military exercises in border areas.
ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Koreaβs Joint Chiefs of Staff said it detected the North launching around 330 balloons toward the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ since Saturday night and about 80 were found in ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean territory as of Sunday morning. The military said winds were blowing eastward on Saturday night, which possibly caused many balloons to float away from ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean territory.
The ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅βs military said the balloons that did land dropped trash, including plastic and paper waste, but no hazardous substances were discovered.
The military, which has mobilized chemical rapid response and explosive clearance units to retrieve the North Korean balloons and materials, alerted the public to beware of falling objects and not to touch balloons found on the ground but report them to police or military authorities.
Saturdayβs balloon launches by North Korea were the third of their kind since May 28. In North Koreaβs previous two rounds of balloon activities, ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean authorities discovered about that were tied to vinyl bags containing manure, cigarette butts, scraps of cloth, waste batteries and waste paper. Some were popped and scattered on roads, residential areas and schools. No highly dangerous materials were found and no major damage has been reported.
The Northβs vice defense minister, Kim Kang Il, later said his country would but threatened to resume it if ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean activists sent leaflets again.
In defiance of the warning, led by North Korean defector Park Sang-hak, said it launched 10 balloons from a border town on Thursday carrying 200,000 anti-North Korean leaflets, USB sticks with K-pop songs and ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean dramas, and $1 U.S. bills. ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean media reported another activist group also flew balloons with 200,000 propaganda leaflets toward North Korea on Friday.
ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean officials called the launches and other recent provocations βabsurd" and "irrationalβ and vowed strong retaliation.
With the loudspeakers, ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea may blare anti-Pyongyang broadcasts, K-pop songs and outside news across the rivals' heavily armed border. North Korea is extremely sensitive to such broadcasts because it fears it could demoralize front-line troops and residents and eventually weaken leader Kim Jong Unβs grip on power, analysts say.
In 2015, when ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea restarted loudspeaker broadcasts for the first time in 11 years, North Korea fired artillery rounds across the border, prompting ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea to return fire, according to ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean officials. No casualties were reported.
Kim in recent years has waged an intensifying campaign to eliminate ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korean cultural and language influences. In January, Kim declared the North will abandon its longstanding goal of a peaceful unification with the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ and rewrite its constitution to cement the ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ as a permanent enemy. Experts say Kim's efforts to reinforce the Northβs separate identity may be aimed at strengthening the Kim familyβs dynastic rule.
North Koreaβs balloon campaign is also possibly meant to cause a divide in ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea over its conservative governmentβs hard-line approach on North Korea.
Liberal lawmakers, some civic groups and front-line residents in ΒιΆΉΚΣΖ΅ Korea have called on the government to urge leafleting activists to stop flying balloons to avoid unnecessary clashes with North Korea. But government officials havenβt made such an appeal in line with last yearβs struck down a law criminalizing an anti-North Korea leafletting as a violation of free speech.
Kim Tong-hyung, The Associated Press