This handout photo taken on June 9, 2024 and provided by the South Korean Defence Ministry shows unidentified objects believed to be North Korean trash from balloons that crossed the inter-Korea border, on a street in Seoul. Photo by Handout / South Korean Defence Ministry / AFP
Seoul: South Korea resumed Sunday a loudspeaker propaganda campaign against the North as Pyongyang sent a fresh barrage of trash-filled balloons across the border.
Relations between the two Koreas are at one of their lowest points in years and in recent weeks the two have engaged in a tit-for-tat campaign of balloon launches, with analysts warning the escalating cycle could end in actual military skirmishes.
Seoul suspended this month a 2018 military deal aimed at reducing tensions on the peninsula after Pyongyang sent hundreds of balloons carrying bags of garbage, including cigarette butts and plastic waste, paving the way for the resumption of the loudspeaker broadcasts.
The loudspeaker broadcasts, a tactic which dates back to the 1950-1953 Korean War, infuriate Pyongyang, which previously threatened artillery strikes against the loudspeaker units unless they were switched off.
"The South Korean military conducted a loudspeaker broadcast this afternoon," Seoul's Joint Chiefs of Staff said, adding that whether additional broadcasts follow "depends entirely on North Korea's actions."
The president's office had earlier confirmed the move, describing it as "corresponding measures" for the more than 300 trash-filled balloons Pyongyang sent across the border in a fresh blitz that started on Saturday.
"Although the measures we are taking may be difficult for the North Korean regime to endure, they will deliver messages of light and hope to the North Korean military and citizens," it said.
Late Sunday, Seoul's military said the North was "again floating (suspected) balloons carrying trash towards the South," advising the public to report any balloons to authorities and refrain from touching them.
'Low class'
Officials in Gyeonggi province sent out a text alert to residents late Sunday, warning about the new balloons.
Seoul's mili
tary has said analysis of the balloons that arrived Saturday "shows there were no substances that were harmful to safety" and that they contained plastic and waste paper.
"North Korea is making another low-class provocation with trash balloons against our civilian areas," Seoul mayor Oh Se-hoon wrote in a Facebook post.
Activists in the South have sent dozens of balloons bearing K-pop, dollar bills and anti-Kim Jong Un propaganda northwards in recent weeks, infuriating the North which has retaliated in kind.
Pyongyang sent nearly a thousand balloons across the border in late May and early June before calling off its campaign. It restarted on Saturday in response to new launches last week by activists, against which Seoul's government has almost no legal recourse.
