North Korea to stop flying trash-filled balloons south

After sending hundreds of balloons loaded with trash and excrement across the border into South Korea, North Korean officials said on Sunday the effort would be halted.

"We will temporarily suspend the action of scattering waste paper beyond the border," said the official Korean Central News Agency. "This is because our action is a thorough countermeasure."

They warned that the balloons would fly south again if Seoul sent any anti-North Korean leaflets northwards.

"We have given the South Koreans a full experience of how disgusting and labor-intensive it is to collect scattered waste paper," the statement added.

The distribution of South Korean leaflets attacking the Kim Jong Un regime has long been a sore spot for relations between the two rival nations.

Kim Jong Un's sister mocks Seoul's reaction

South Korea has decried the sending of trash-filled balloons as "low-class" and warned its own response would be "unendurable."

The anti-Kim Jong Un pamphlets are usually sent across the heavily militarized border by South Korean activists and North Korean defectors. The packages occasionally include money or rice to attract the attention of the people inside the impoverished country. Some of them also contain USB drives with content such as South Korean TV shows.

South Korean lawmakers criminalized the practice of sending balloons to North Korea in 2020, but the move was struck down by South Korea's Constitutional Court last year. The judges described the ban as an impediment to free speech.

Kim Yo Jong, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's sister and a prominent spokesperson for the North Korean government, mocked South Korea's complaints about the balloons, claiming that North Koreans were merely exercising their freedom of expression.

Tensions rising under Yoon Suk Yeol

Ahead of the North Korean statement on Sunday, South Korea's National Security Council met to contemplate a response to balloons sent by Pyongyang. One of the options reported to have been considered by South Korean authorities was to resume blasting propaganda via massive loudspeakers along the border.

The practice, previously in use, was halted in 2018.

The South Korean army also said they were tracking the balloons and collecting the debris.

Tensions between the two nations have been on the rise following South Korea's presidential election in 2022, which ended with right-wing leader Yoon Suk Yeol taking office. Yoon is seen as pursuing a tougher line on North Korea compared to his predecessors. 

In recent years, North Korea has ramped up weapons testing, including missile and satellite launches. Last week, Pyongyang fired a barrage of missiles into the sea simulating an attack on South Korea. Some experts have speculated North Korea would continue to escalate tensions until the US presidential election this November.

dj/ab (AFP, Reuters)