World

North Korea to Reactivate Loudspeaker Campaign on South Korean Border in October

By Yonhap

Kim Yo‑jong, a department director at the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea, announced on Wednesday that North Korea will resume propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts toward South Korea within October. She described the action as a response to perceived threats and as the "most just measure" and an "appropriate response." Kim said she inspected key positions along the southern border earlier that day with Pak Jong‑chon, an adviser to the North’s Ministry of National Defense, to review progress on fortification work. The inspection was corrected from a previous KCNA report that had placed it on Tuesday. Kim stated that the loudspeakers for psychological warfare against the Republic of Korea will be in operation along the whole border. She also noted that the North’s army is carrying out a crucial undertaking in the face of the enemy’s persistent threats and that fortifying the border will eliminate the danger of military conflict in the area. Pak Jong‑chon accused the enemy of making "deliberate, premeditated and absurd" claims that North Korean troops had crossed the border during the inspection and urged troops to turn the borderline into an impregnable fortress. The KCNA reported that Kim said the North’s leader had issued an order to fortify the border with an enemy state to be eternally impregnable. North Korea began reinforcing the inter‑Korean border in April 2024, adding barbed‑wire fences, mines and anti‑tank barriers along the Military Demarcation Line after leader Kim Jong‑un declared the two Koreas to be "two states hostile to each other" the previous year. Tensions have risen following land mine explosions in the Demilitarized Zone last month that injured three South Korean soldiers, which South Korea attributes to mines planted by North Korea, a claim denied by the North.