THE POWERFUL sister of North Korean
leader Kim Jong Un on Thursday dismissed South Korean claims the North is
removing some of its loudspeakers along the inter-Korean border, mocking the
government in Seoul for clinging to hopes of renewed diplomacy between the
war-divided rivals.
South Korea’s military said over the
weekend that it had detected the North removing some of its loudspeakers, days
after the South dismantled its own front-line speakers used for anti-North
propaganda broadcasts in a bid to ease tensions.
Kim Yo Jong reiterated previous North
Korean statements that it has no immediate interest in reviving long-stalled
negotiations with Washington and Seoul, citing an upcoming joint military
exercise between the allies as proof of their continued hostility toward
Pyongyang.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff
did not disclose where it spotted the North removing some of its speakers. The
North Korean speakers that have been visible from civilian-accessible border areas
in the South were still seen by AP photojournalists after the military’s
announcement.
The issue of loudspeakers
North Korea, extremely sensitive to
any outside criticism of its authoritarian leadership and its third-generation
ruler, had seen South Korea’s anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts as a major
provocation.
The South’s previous conservative
government resumed daily loudspeaker broadcasts in June last year, following a
yearslong pause, in retaliation for North Korea flying trash-laden balloons
toward the South.
Tensions on the peninsula could rise
later this month with the large-scale annual combined U.S.-South Korean
military exercises that start Aug. 18.
North Korea portrays the joint drills
as invasion rehearsals and often uses them as a pretext for military
demonstrations and weapons tests to advance its nuclear program.
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