SEOUL, June 8 ― North Korea again sent trash-carrying balloons towards the South today, the South Korean military said, after anti-Pyongyang activists in the South said they have sent balloons with leaflets against leader Kim Jong Un.
“North Korea is again floating (suspected) balloons carrying trash towards the South,” the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement, advising the public to refrain from touching the balloons if spotted and to report them to authorities.
The announcement came hours after Seoul’s military said it was on alert for possibly more trash-carrying balloons arriving from North Korea, a potential response to the propaganda balloons sent this week by activists in the South.
The Seoul city government, as well as the Gyeonggi Province, also sent a similar text alert to residents today, warning about the balloons.
North Korea sent hundreds of balloons in two waves last week with bags of trash into the South, describing them as a response to anti-Pyongyang propaganda balloons sent the other way by South Korean activists.
Pyongyang announced a halt to the balloons last Sunday but days later, a South Korean group called “Fighters for Free North Korea” said it had sent 10 balloons with USB thumb drives containing K-pop music and 200,000 leaflets against leader Kim Jong Un.
Another group, comprising North Korean defectors, said it had sent 10 balloons on Friday with 200,000 anti-Pyongyang leaflets, 100 radios, and USB thumb drives containing a speech by South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol.
North Korea had said it would respond with “wastepaper and rubbish” a hundred times the amount if more South Korean leaflets were sent.
Last year, South Korea’s Constitutional Court struck down a 2020 law that criminalised the sending of anti-Pyongyang propaganda, calling it an undue limitation on free speech.
Experts say there are now no legal grounds for the government to stop activists from sending balloons into North Korea.
South Korea’s unification ministry said today that the issue is “being approached in consideration” of the 2023 court decision.
Kim Jong Un’s powerful sister Kim Yo Jong mocked South Korea for complaining about the balloons last week, saying North Koreans were simply exercising their freedom of expression. ― AFP
