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Kim Jong Un launches more rubbish-carrying balloons across southern border in retaliation for Seoul dropping anti-North Korean leaflets
Kim Jong Un has launched more rubbish-carrying balloons toward South Korea after around 260 were sent earlier in the week, according to South Korea's military, in what Pyongyang calls retaliation for activists flying anti-North Korean leaflets across the border.
Between Tuesday and Wednesday, balloons carrying various items of rubbish, including plastic bottles, batteries, toilet paper and what is believed to be manure, were dropped in in eight of nine provinces in South Korea, an official of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
South Korea's Yonhap news agency, citing anonymous military sources, said officials as of Saturday night found about 90 new balloons that dropped paper and plastic trash and cigarette buts in areas in the capital, Seoul, and nearby Gyeonggi province.
The military advised people to beware of falling objects and not to touch objects suspected to be from North Korea but to report them to military or police officers instead. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.
In Seoul, the city government sent text alerts saying that unidentified objects suspected to be flown from North Korea were detected in skies near the city and that the military was responding to them.
Kim Jong Un has launched more rubbish-carrying balloons toward South Korea after around 260 were sent earlier in the week
Between Tuesday and Wednesday, balloons carrying various items of rubbish, including plastic bottles, batteries, toilet paper and what is believed to be manure, were dropped in in eight of nine provinces in South Korea
The North's balloon launches added to a recent series of provocative steps, which include its failed spy satellite launch and and a barrage of short-range missiles launches this week that the North said was intended to demonstrate its ability to attack the South preemptively.
South Korea's military dispatched chemical rapid response and explosive clearance teams to recover the debris from some 260 North Korean balloons that were found in various parts of the country from Tuesday night to Wednesday.
The military said the balloons carried various types of trash and manure but no dangerous substances like chemical, biological or radioactive materials. Some of the balloons were found with timers that suggested they were designed to pop the bags of trash midair.
In a statement on Wednesday, Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, confirmed that the North sent the balloons to make good on her country's recent threat to 'scatter mounds of wastepaper and filth' in South Korea in response to leafleting campaigns by South Korean activists.
Image hows trash from a balloon presumably sent by North Korea, in Seoul on Wednesday
South Korean soldiers collect balloons presumably sent by North Korea, found at a hill in Pyeongtaek on Wednesday. Some 200 such balloons have been discovered nationwide so far, military and police sources said, adding that they contained mostly trash and other waste
She hinted that balloons could become the North's standard response to leafleting moving forward, saying that the North would respond by 'scattering rubbish dozens of times more than those being scattered to us'.
South Korea's military has said it has no plans to shoot down the balloons, citing concerns about causing damage or the possibility that they might contain dangerous substances. Firing at balloons near the border would also risk triggering a retaliation from the North at a time of high tensions.
'(We) decided it was best to let the balloons drop and recover them safely,' Lee Sung Joon, spokesperson of South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during a briefing Thursday.
North Korea is extremely sensitive about any outside attempt to undermine Kim Jong Un's absolute control over the country's 26 million people, most of whom have little access to foreign news.
A balloon believed to have been sent by North Korea, carrying various objects including what appeared to be trash and excrement, is seen over a rice field at Cheorwon, South Korea on Wednesday
In another sign of tensions between the war-divided rivals, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said North Korea also has been flying large numbers of balloons carrying trash toward the South since Tuesday night, in an apparent retaliation against South Korean activists for flying anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets across the border
In 2020, North Korea blew up an empty South Korean-built liaison office on its territory after a furious response to South Korean civilian leafleting campaigns.
In 2014, North Korea fired at propaganda balloons flying toward its territory and South Korea returned fire, though there were no casualties.
In 2022, North Korea even suggested that balloons flown from South Korea had caused a COVID-19 outbreak in the isolated nation, a highly questionable claim that appeared to be an attempt to blame the South for worsening inter-Korean relations.