SEOUL • North Korea is gearing up to send propaganda leaflets over its southern border, denouncing North Korean defectors and South Korea, its state media said yesterday, the latest retaliation for leaflets from the South as bilateral tensions rise.
Enraged North Korean people across the country “are actively pushing forward with the preparations for launching a large-scale distribution of leaflets”, which are piled as high as a mountain, said state news agency KCNA.
“Every action should be met with proper reaction and only when one experiences it oneself, one can feel how offending it is,” KCNA said.
Photos carried by the official Rodong Sinmun newspaper showed North Koreans preparing the leaflets, and cigarette butts and ashes scattered over fliers featuring the face of South Korean President Moon Jae-in.
One of the leaflets with an image of Mr Moon drinking a cup of unidentified beverage read: “(He has) eaten it all, including the North-South Korea agreement.”
Pyongyang has blamed North Korean defectors for launching propaganda leaflets across the border and threatened military action.
It upped the ante last Tuesday with the dramatic demolition of a building on its side of the border that symbolised inter-Korean rapprochement, to show its displeasure against the defectors and South Korea for not stopping them from launching the leaflets.
South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which is responsible for inter-Korean dialogue, said yesterday that Pyongyang’s plan to send leaflets over the bother was “extremely regrettable,” and urged it to withdraw the plan immediately.
Seoul earlier this month filed a police complaint against two North Korean defector groups over the leaflets. One of the groups said on Friday that it had abandoned its plan to send hundreds of plastic bottles stuffed with rice, medicine and face masks to North Korea by throwing them into the sea near the border today.
The two Koreas, which are still technically at war as their 1950-53 conflict ended without a peace treaty, have waged leaflet campaigns for decades. South Korea’s military used to launch anti-North fliers across the demilitarised zone, but the programme ended in 2010.
Several defector-led groups have regularly sent back fliers – criticising the North’s leader over human rights abuses and his nuclear ambitions – together with food, US$1 bills, mini radios and USB sticks containing South Korean dramas and news, usually by balloon over the border or in bottles by river.
One of the leaflets with an image of Mr Moon drinking a cup of unidentified beverage read: “(He has) eaten it all, including the North-South Korea agreement.”
Pyongyang has used balloons to send its anti-South leaflets.
South Koreans were previously rewarded with stationery if they reported leaflets from the North.
Analysts say North Korea may be seeking to manufacture a crisis to increase pressure on South Korea to extract concessions.
REUTERS, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
